Alibaba blockchain payments patent revealed

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has filed a patent for the use of blockchain technology in speeding up international payments.

The application, ‘A System and Method That Adjusts Account Balance on a Blockchain’, was filed with the China State Intellectual Property Office in January, but only revealed on Friday. The proposed system will facilitate cross-border transactions that directly involve third party vendors.

Last year, Alibaba discussed its blockchain plans in a paper entitled ‘Blockchain, Artificial Intelligence, Security, Internet of Things and Cloud Computing’ (BASIC). It is currently involved in projects in such sectors as food, healthcare and supply chain. And last week, it was announced that AlipayHK, a digital wallet JV between Ant Financial, of which Alibaba owns 33%,and CK Hutchison Holdings, had teamed with payment service platform GCash for the launch of a cross-border remittance service based on blockchain technology.