Microsoft just got serious about blockchain technology.
The company announced this week that it has launched a cloud-based blockchain platform with ConsenSys, a startup based out of Brooklyn in New York City. The platform is designed to provide a method for financial institutions to test out the blockchain.
The blockchain is most known for being the technology that underpins bitcoin, but in recent months the term blockchain — which is the decentralized ledger technology that records bitcoin transactions — has been the buzzword, leaving bitcoin a bit in the dust. Its technology, of course, is not limited to bitcoin, as companies have been testing how blockchains can be used to secure and transmit multiple types of data in more secure and efficient manners.
In this particular instance, Microsoft and ConsenSys have partnered on the service that will be known as Ethereum Blockchain as a Service (EBaaS). The service will be on Microsoft Azure so Enterprise clients/developers can test working with cloud-based blockchain technologies.
Enterprises using the platform will have access to the cloud-based technology without having to invest in building their own systems.
“The Enterprise Partner Group at Microsoft is on the front lines with some of our largest customers. Everyone, particularly financial services, is interested in blockchain technology. While a platform like bitcoin has many great uses specifically as a cryptocurrency, Ethereum provides the flexibility and extensibility many of our customers were looking for. With the Frontier Release last summer, Ethereum is real and has a vibrant community of developers, enthusiasts and businesses participating,” Marley Gray, Microsoft’s Director of Technology Strategy For U.S. Financial Services, wrote in a blog post.
As Gray points out, blockchain’s technology has most recently been attracting those in the financial services sectors, mainly because of its ability to innovate the space. What Ethereum Blockchain as a Service allows FS customers to do, he notes, is “allow them to create private, public and consortium-based blockchain environments using industry-leading frameworks very quickly, distributing their blockchain products with Azure’s worldwide distributed (private) platform.”
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