R3 welcomes CIB bank Egypt to distributed ledger consortium

Egypt’s largest listed bank, Commercial International Bank (CIB) has joined the financial innovation firm R3’s global network of members, it said in a statement on Wednesday. CIB is the first bank in Egypt and the North African region to join the New York-based blockchain startup consoritium.

CIB said it would work with the R3 consortium on the advancement of distributed ledger technology (DLT) and Blockchain technologies in financial services. It will collaborate with over 100 global banks, financial institutions, trade associations, and professional services firms to develop ground-breaking commercial applications for the financial services industry.

Members will work closely with R3 to continue the development of Corda, an open source distributed ledger platform for recording, managing and synchronizing financial agreements, the Egyptian bank added.

“The relationship with R3 represents a powerful opportunity for CIB to significantly expand our presence regionally.” Hisham Ezz Al-Arab, CIB chairman, said.

“CIB joins over a hundred other R3 members from all corners of globe in developing robust industry grade solutions that will become the new operating system for financial services.” David Rutter, chief executive of R3, said.