The UK branch of Santander announced its plan to launch an international money transfer app in partnership with the blockchain startup Ripple in coming months that has already been through the testing phase. This is the latest attempt in Ripple’s part to capture the banking industry that is dominated by the 40-years-old Swift.


UK Santander Ripple combo tested international money transfer app

The UK bank, Santander is planning to launch an international money transfer app in collaboration with Ripple in the coming months. Ripple is a real-time settlement system that is designed to be used by banks for gross settlement, remittance, and currency exchange.

In a conference on Friday, the CEO of UK Santander Bank, Nathan Bostock told that:

“This spring, if not one beats us to it, we will be the first large retail bank to carry out cross-border payments at scale with blockchain technology.”

However, he didn’t reveal the specific date for the launch of the product. In 2015, Santander first invested in the Ripple and later again in 2016. In 2016 itself, the bank also tested an international app by using Ripple technology.

The CEO of Santander, Ana Botin gave the payment app’s upcoming launch a green signal that would go live in the UK, Brazil, Poland, and Spain.


Talking about the internal app trial, Santander said that the technology allows the settlement of transfers within 24 hours as compared to the time taken by the traditional payment systems. Additionally, unlike the systems where middlemen are involved and cost cuts happen along the way, ripple technology even lets people know the cost of the transfer.

Also, read: Ripple Vs R3 Lawsuit: The Battle For Billion-Dollar XRP Cryptocurrency

Ripple’s attempt to dethrone swift with blockchain technology

Founded in 2012, Ripple is headquartered in San Francisco that utilizes the cryptocurrency and blockchain solutions to the world’s transfer and payments market. As a part of its effort to capture the global financial market, Ripple has entered into numerous partnerships with banks all over the globe.

Western Union and MoneyGram are already working on its liquidity feature in association with xRapid. Moreover, UAE Exchange, which is basically a transfer business utilizes xCurrent, which is Ripple’s international transfer platform.

With its partnerships with banks worldwide, Ripple is trying to capture the market that is dominated by Swift, for the past 40 years. Recently, Swift launched its biggest overhaul in about a decade that is GPI short for global payments innovation for the corporate clients of banks. Inclusive of delivery style tracking features, it is faster than swift’s existing system.

Ripple is certainly giving a tough competition to the decades-old Swift with it’s over 100 signed memberships. It would be interesting to see how Ripple’s partnerships and blockchain system testing helps the startup in making it big in the lucrative banking industry.

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