One of the leading payment processors of the world and financial giant, Mastercard announced recently that they are expanding their team with 175 additional technology developers, which will include Blockchain experts. The developers will work in the company’s office in Leopardstown, Ireland where Mastercard Labs is headquartered. Mastercard Labs is Mastercard’s research and development arm.

These blockchain specialists will be working on creating a more efficient payment system. This was confirmed in an official press release. The company also said that they will be working on expanding their access to financial services. The country manager for Mastercard in Ireland, Sonya Geelon stated that the company is working on expanding and it’s safe to say that the company’s ambitions are huge. Sonya added:

“We’re driving projects that promote financial inclusion at home and abroad, and are working to provide consumers, businesses and governments with the most innovative, safe and secure ways to pay.”

Mastercard sees the potential of blockchain technology

It’s safe to say that Mastercard’s blockchain ambitions are huge. It is reported that the payment processing giant has been eyeing blockchain applications for payment services for a while now. In October 2017, the company announced that they will use API programs to facilitate B2B (business to business) transactions. Mastercard’s blockchain ambitions can be seen with the company’s efforts to obtain a patent related to blockchain technology.

After releasing a set of experimental blockchain Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) back in 2016, the payment giant made an announcement that the company is aiming to “give developers the chance to work on new and emerging technologies that are not commercialized yet”.

In a filing that happened last September, the company revealed their plans for a new blockchain-based system that will be able to keep record of invoices, transaction data and purchase history. Later the same year, Mastercard revealed another app that will act as a blockchain solution to speed up transaction times.

Blockchain technology proved that it has many security features and practical applications across many industries. With more and more companies embracing and investing in blockchain development, it will be interesting to see how the technology will evolve in 2018.