we.trade joins forces with three former Batavia consortium banks

• CaixaBank, Erste Group and UBS join we.trade as shareholders and banking partners
• Accelerates the development of we.trade’s blockchain-based trade financing platform

we.trade, a leader of blockchain-based digital trade services, and three banks from the former Batavia consortium have joined forces. CaixaBank, Erste Group and UBS have joined we.trade as banking partners and shareholders alongside the platform’s existing banks: Deutsche Bank, HSBC, KBC, Natixis, Nordea, Rabobank, Santander, Societe Generale and UniCredit, bringing the number of shareholders to twelve.

The joint endeavour ensures that companies can access the platform’s unprecedented market reach and use their network for their international trade needs, distributing we.trade across 13 countries.

Following we.trade’s successful launch in June, the additional banking partners strengthen the platform’s position as the largest blockchain-based digital trade financing company in production. The shareholder banks have identified significant product and technology synergies with the former Batavia banks, as they have all developed similar solutions with IBM on Hyperledger Fabric, an open source blockchain framework hosted by The Linux Foundation.

“We’re glad that Erste Group is joining we.trade as an equal shareholder, allowing us to put together our knowledge of blockchain-based trade services, which we have built up within Batavia, and to make we.trade’s uniquely convincing offering available to our corporate clients. The enlarged we.trade stands out among trade services platforms through its innovative and proven application of blockchain technology and its unparalleled reach across markets,” said Ingo Bleier, Head of Group Corporates at Erste Group.

we.trade continues to expand and evaluate additional partners from both the banking and non-banking sectors to join its vision of an open and interoperable platform. The addition of CaixaBank, Erste Group and UBS extends we.trade’s geographical reach to the following European countries -Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.

The we.trade platform addresses the expectations of companies to make cross-border trade more straightforward through the extension of its digital trade network. The distribution force of participating international financial institutions positions we.trade as an innovator in the trade finance market and as a leading partner for its market adoption and expansion beyond Europe.

The full-length version of we.trade’s press release is available for download below: