Ripple, a blockchain platform to streamline cross-border settlement for financial institutions, has joined Mojaloop Foundation, an open-source software empowering organizations to create interoperable digital payment systems to increase financial inclusion, as sponsor members.
Mojaloop Foundation announced the news in a press release on Wednesday, September 16. According to the announcement, Ripple is now a sponsor member of Mojaloop, which is the highest level of the organization.
As per the terms of this deal, Ripple’s Head of Social Impact Ken Weber will join Mojaloops’s board of directors and “and help provide the strategic vision, governance, and technical guidance to ensure the long-term health and growth of the Mojaloop open source software and development community.”
Besides Ripple, PhonePe, India’s leading digital payments platform have also joined Mojaloop as a sponsor member. Two companies have also joined the foundation as Promotor members that include a Swiss company providing central banks with a unique digital banknote form of retail Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC), Giori Digital SA, and a leading global provider of payment solutions and a low-code development platform for digital transformation, Sybrin.
Mojaloop, launched in May 2020, is open-source software that aims to provide a reference model for payment interoperability, that can be used to overcome barriers that have slowed the spread of digital financial services.
According to Mojaloop, despite the rise of mobile money services, a significant number of people still lacks access to digital financial services. Furthermore, payment providers struggle with the high cost of creating no-fee or low-fee, cross border payment systems that interoperate with others.
Mojaloop, with the support of its sponsor and promotor members, will serve as a model for how to simplify and reduce the cost of payment interoperability. Interoperable financial services could profit growing economies a lot as, according to an estimate, interoperable payments systems will add $3.7 trillion to emerging countries’ GDP by 2025.
Mojaloop Foundation’s new members will help it to exactly do that. Paula Hunter, executive director of the Mojaloop Foundation, commented:
“Mojaloop Foundation’s financial inclusion mission has resonated loudly with many organizations. We are very pleased to welcome our newest members, including PhonePe and Ripple as Sponsor members and Giori Digital and Sybrin as Promoter members. We continue to advance and support Mojaloop open-source software, collaborate with our community, and hold convenings to serve as a path forward for organizations creating interoperable payments platforms to connect all digital financial providers and customers within an economy. We welcome any organization that has an interest in advancing digital financial inclusion to join the organization.”
Ripple’s corporate social impact program, Ripple for Good, is also designed to help mission-driven organizations like Mojaloop. Ken Weber, Head of Social Impact at Ripple, stated:
“Creating economic fairness and opportunity for the unbanked and vulnerable populations is Ripple’s highest social impact priority—a natural extension of Ripple’s core business, which is making cross-border payments faster, cheaper, and more reliable and accessible for hundreds of millions of consumers and businesses globally. Ripple has been involved with the Mojaloop project since the start, providing technical advice and engineering support and are proud to continue to collaborate with fellow Mojaloop Sponsor members in working toward a more inclusive future where everyone, everywhere can access digital financial services needed to connect to the global economy.”
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