How meta is that! Nasdaq has scored some blockchain points, as the stock exchange has enlisted Microsoft to integrate blockchain offering into its services.
More specifically, the Nasdaq Financial Framework.
As per the announcement, Redmond will integrate its Azure blockchain service with NFF, which is a technology that provides software for trading infrastructure and operations outsourcing. It also fulfills risk and surveillance processes for the stock exchange.
Nasdaq already has a strong history of leading the capital markets industry with new technologies, but this development suggests a growing demand offered by blockchain through the broader Fintech industry.
The companies are basically working to develop ledger agnostic blockchain capability that will support operability between multiple ledgers.
It will make things easier for Nasdaq customers by allowing them to connect buyers and sellers, facilitate better management of delivery and streamline the payment and settlement of transactions.
Tom Fay, the Senior Vice President of Enterprise Architecture at Nasdaq:
“Our NFF integration with their blockchain services provides a layer of abstraction, making our offering ledger-agnostic, secure, highly scalable, and ultimately helps us continue to explore a much broader range of customer use cases for blockchain. As more industries move towards capital markets technology and structures, we see the potential for blockchain to provide value in secure, frictionless and instantaneous matching of buyers and sellers.”
This integration of Microsoft Azure blockchain with the Nasdaq Financial Framework will allow NFF customers to use different blockchains through a single interface — thereby removing many complexities and accelerate the use of the blockchain technology.
Essentially, this is not a single blockchain by definition, but rather a blockchain based system that exists on top of other blockchains to get them to all play nice.
Redmond has been engaged with blockchains for quite some time now, and not just with financial applications. The company has been using blockchain to curb spam calls in India, while it has also developed an online identity management system using the technology.
