A consumer payments platform backed by MIT Media Lab, Mastercard and Ripple is integrating Ripple’s XRP-powered xRapid to lower the cost and increase efficiency of cross-border payments.
SendFriend is set to launch this year, and is targeting the Philippines to give expatriates a cost-effective way to send money back home. The project, winner of the MIT Media Lab Translational Innovation Alliance Award, was developed at MIT by CEO and founder David Lighton.
According to American Banker, Lighton says xRapid offers a new level of efficiency.
“That allows us on the back end to be more efficient with our capital. These are real-time settlements so we don’t have to do pre-funding, we don’t have to park money in the receiving corridor and then manage the foreign exchange risk. We can just do it one by one as the transactions go through.”
The platform is designed for the millions of migrant workers who overpay for international money transfers.
SendFriend says the company’s complete list of backers includes Barclays, Techstars, Ripple, MIT Media Lab, Mahindra Finance and the MasterCard Foundation.
Ripple’s xRapid is designed to utilize XRP to power instant cross-border transactions between financial institutions. You can check out more on how it works here.
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