Japan’s Shinsei Bank, Nippon Wealth Form Business Alliance with Blockchain Startup ConsenSys

Japan’s Shinsei Bank has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with blockchain startup ConsenSys to widen its exploration of the technology’s applications for finance, Cointelegraph Japan reports Nov. 8.

According to an English-language press release published the same date, the MoU entails a business alliance between Shinsei Bank, Hong Kong-based restricted license bank Nippon Wealth, Singaporean private equity fund Tribay Capital, and ConsenSys. The latter was founded in 2014 by Ethereum (ETH) co-founder Joseph Lubin, and is currently headquartered in New York.

The alliance between the four entities will focus on exploring the use of ConsenSys’ decentralized applications (DApps) to develop new financial products and services, with Nippon Wealth spearheading a study of blockchain infrastructure and protocols for the banking sector.

According to the press release, Nippon Wealth has “completed a capital injection through a third-party allocation of shares of OJBC Co., Ltd., its owner. The alliance means that Tribay Capital will become a new shareholder of Nippon, with Shinsei Bank nonetheless remaining its majority shareholder — retaining 50 percent of shareholder rights, according to CT Japan.

Following the study, the parties have indicated they will roll out blockchain-related offerings and details of new services on their banking platforms “at a later date.”

This week, a cybersecurity subsidiary of Japan’s Nomura Research Institute (NRI) announced a new blockchain security alert tool while also confirming a partnership with ConsenSys.

As recently reported, blockchain is becoming a key focus of Japan’s traditional financial sector, with multinational IT firm Fujitsu announcing late October its plans build an interbank settlement platform using blockchain technology as part of a joint project with nine domestic banks.

Also in October, Japanese financial services giant SBI Group debuted a Ripple (XRP)-powered settlement system that harnesses Ripple’s xCurrent solution to enable domestic bank-to-bank transfers in “real time.”