A project backed by Bitpanda, a Fintech company offering digital currency trading with bases in Austria, has partnered with Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI), a corporate and investment bank with a presence in 13 markets across Central and Eastern Europe, to roll out a blockchain Proof-of-Concept for banking interoperability and give back to the blockchain community as per an announcement on Oct22.
The Pantos Project and Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) Partnership
The deal is a culmination of two years of research and development under the open-source Pantos (PAN) Project. The PAN team wanted to publicly and rapidly build a flexible, stable, and liquid working solution from readily available state-of-the-art technologies, therefore settling on the blockchain.
The project is a joint venture between Bitpanda and the Technical University of Vienna. It seeks to “answer to an increasingly fragmented digital currency market” by introducing a multi-token system for blockchain interoperability, a basis for setting a standard for decentralized cross-chain token transfers.
Other developers are the Research Institute for Future Cryptoeconomics (RIAT) and the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
Further Developing the Pantos Protocol
Through the deal, it is expected that RBI will help in the development of the PAN project through technology unification paving the way for fluidity and efficiency.
Presently, the PAN project supports several public chains including Komodo, Bitcoin, Ethereum, NEM, Lisk, and Waves.
Paul Klanschek, Co-Founder and CEO of Bitpanda, said:
“We see a lot of competing protocols, not only from the cryptocurrency space but also from tech-companies, banks, and governments. The question of how to unite all those protocols remains unanswered. The Pantos project aims to offer a unifying solution for the fragmented blockchain and cryptocurrency space.”
Testing Interoperability Using the RBI Coin
To kick-start the process, the Austrian bank will trial the solution using an experimental RBI Coin. The digital currency streamlines cash and liquidity management. It is designed as a next-gen digital cash solution for banks and enterprises that will introduce new products for corporate and institutional customers.
The RBI Coin will be a core to the partnership, seeking to eventually resolve interoperability issues faced by different dApps based in fragment blockchains.
Last year, As reported Bitpanda’s receipt of the Payments Services Directive 2 (PSD2) license from Austrian financial regulators.
