It’s no secret that Ripple, the creator of XRP, has been on a charm offensive to rope in as many RippleNet customers as possible. With this strong effort, the company has seen its customer base explode and grow in huge figures. At the moment, the San Francisco based blockchain company has over 200 customers under its belt.

As many already know, Ripple is the innovative company behind XRP, the current third largest crypto in the world. On its part, XRP has seen its huge share of growth especially in terms of market capitalization. However, there hasn’t been much activity in its price range over the last week, but that could change soon. As expected, Ripple’s success in bringing in more customers would work greatly in favor of XRP.

Ripple And XRP To Make A Debut In Dubai

The latest of these efforts is Ripple’s entry into the Asian market. The largest Islamic bank in Saudi Arabia, Al-Rajhi, joined RippleNet just a few weeks ago. Another one is the Kuwait Finance House. However, it’s the latest announcement that could really trigger a noticeable market event. While attending a conference in Dubai, U.A.E, Ripple’s Dilip Rao had some good news to share. Rao is the head of Ripple’s Global Infrastructure Innovation.

During his speech, Dilip announced Ripple’s plans to fully enter the Asian market by setting up a base of operations in Dubai. This is expected to be realized before the end of 2018. Going further, Rao explained the importance of Ripple’s technology and what it means for the workers within the Middle East. Given that many workers in the region are foreigners who send money to their home countries, there has been a serious problem in that the transaction fees charged haven’t favored them. Also, the time it takes for the transactions to go through is something of a disappointment to many.

Dilip Rao explained that Ripple aims to eliminate these burdens by introducing a fast transaction processing system that charges negligible figures in transaction fees. Also, he talked of Ripple’s InterLedger Protocol. If implemented, the ILP will allow various ledgers to connect and make funds transfer all the more easier and faster. Currently, the XRP network can handle around 1,500 transactions per second. That makes it the world’s fastest crypto network.

The Middle East Loves Blockchain

The UAE, and the Middle East at large, has been very receptive of the blockchain technology. Just this April, the U.A.E government announced plans to use the technology to handle government transactions and data. These will include the citizen’s legal documents and other financial data. Also, the First Islamic Cryptocurrency Exchange (FICE) will be launching in 2019.

As with other cryptocurrencies, such developments are bound to affect XRP prices. The fact that the banks on RippleNet use XRP as the funds transfer currency could send the crypto’s price skyrocketing. Things could get even better as more banks join the network and XRP adoption increases.