Seven Stars Cloud to raise $24bn for electric buses in China

US-based blockchain venture Seven Stars Cloud Group (SSC) has announced a deal with China’s largest transportation companies, National Transportation Capacity (NTS), to secure $24 billion in funding to replace all buses in that country with electric ones by 2021.

SSC will be committed to organising two funding campaigns. The first will be in China for $8.76 billion and the second one will be on a global scale for $15 billion. The market size for the necessary replacements and upgrades to achieve fully-electric bus operations in China is estimated at $145 billion.

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“This is a truly ground-breaking deal globally for blockchain-based FinTech companies to gain such a large-scale, asset-backed, contract,” says SSC CEO Bruno Wu. “It represents a new era and a paradigm shift in the way in which we view asset-based financial products.”

The deal “will serve as a window to the world on how traditional industries can unlock asset value and liquidity as we take fixed income products into the digital era”.

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“By combining regulated financial infrastructure, and the market confidence in asset-based products, with AI-enhanced risk management and the dynamics of blockchain-enabled fractionalisation, securitisation, tokenisation, and global trading of token-based offerings, we are delivering the next generation of financial products which will be compelling for both asset-rich industries and investors alike,” adds Wu.

Historic asset digitisation

NTS President Jihong Huang says “We’re delighted to enter into this deal, which is historic in terms of fixed-income asset digitisation.”

He says SSC has taken traditional lease financing business offerings and “rejuvenated them with today’s new technology, in which flexibility, fractionalisation, and global accessibility are key. A combination of SSC’s blockchain and AI technologies, combined with our shared mission for unlocking both liquidity and enterprise value through asset digitisation, will result in a significant transformation of the entire lease financing-based fixed income market.”

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Jihong says China’s 10 leading bus manufacturers back the initiative. He believes the “success of this transaction will place asset-backed digital offerings firmly on the map”.