Nothing less than 20 big banks have invested in Ripple-centric Money Tap, a smartphone application deployed for money transfer.

Among these financial institutions are those that will be participating in the domestic and foreign exchange consolidation consortium, while others are to participate as shareholders.

These week, 7 new banks are added to the already mentioned 13, making it 20 banks all together. The seven new banks with the previous ones have equity in MoneyTap.

MoneyTap is being managed by SBI Holdings, a renowned Japan based financial firm. The application survives on Ripple’s xCurrent, a solution deployed for cross-border remittance service.

The app is available for cross-border payment all day, and it makes use of QR codes, banks accounts and phone number to perfect transaction.

Earlier, different banks affiliated with the application said it offers almost instant transfer without any form of delay. At the moment, only Suminobu SBI Net Bank and Suruga Bank are compatible with the application.

The latest list of banks that joins MoneyTap as investors are 7, namely, Fukushima Bank, Towa Bank, Toho Bank, Chibuko Bank, Ashiga Bank, Shimane Bank, and an unnamed bank. The latest banks makes it 20 overall that have invested in the cross-border remittance firm.

MoneyTap was unveiled as a result of the partnership between Ripple and a consortium of banks spearheaded by SBI, referred to as SBI-Ripple Asia.

Recently, MoneyTap launched MoneyTap Affiliated store settlement service. Although at that period, it was demonstration test of the Ripple-centric technology and registration of its Electronic payment agency business. The initiative is fashioned to create opportunities for the establishment of a payment system that makes use of MoneyTap in real stores.

The innovation was first tested when SBI conducted a QR code affiliated store settlement in a restaurant in Roppongi 1-chome Izumi Garden Tower, in Japan.

The MoneyTap latest development is coming few weeks after Ripple announced an investment of $50 million in MoneyGram. The investment will make MoneyGram explore XRP-dependent XRP for cross-border payment.

Ripple has been at the forefront unleashing different remittance tool. The partnership between Ripple and MoneyGram is said to have the possibility of increasing the adoption of XRP across the globe, since MoneyGram will be using XRP to service customers in close to 200 countries where the second largest remittance firm operates.

This partnership may give Ripple the opportunity of collaborating with Western Union, which is still testing Ripple’s remittance solution.

Image Credit: SBI Group.