SIX Securities Services, the post-trade infrastructure operator for the Swiss financial sector, and Digital Asset Holdings, a developer of distributed ledger technology for the financial services industry, today announced plans to develop a proof of concept that will demonstrate the commercial viability of distributed ledger technology across the Swiss financial market, with an initial prototype for securities lifecycle processing. The two firms will also develop a roadmap for future opportunities spanning the whole market infrastructure value chain.

SIX Securities Services recognizes the potential of distributed ledger technology and after a competitive evaluation process has selected Digital Asset as the business and technology partner for the design of a solution for the Swiss market. The initial phase of the project will demonstrate the ability to build and incorporate distributed, encrypted, straight through processing tools into existing securities transaction flows, and propose a roadmap for extending this to a production-ready service.

The proof of concept will extend beyond the scope of the prototype, and Digital Asset will develop a product roadmap for future opportunities to include a wide range of applications that demonstrate how current, segregated processes could be streamlined and made more efficient for SIX Securities Services and the post-trade ecosystem as a whole.

SIX Securities Services has already made significant strides in exploring distributed ledger technologies and currently has a prototype for Corporate Actions processing on display at Sibos, in Geneva from 26- 29 September 2016.

According to Thomas Zeeb, Division CEO SIX Securities Services: "Distributed ledger technology and its potential role in post trading is key to our business. We need to understand it, and more importantly, its applicability and future flexibility in order to keep ahead of the game. Partnering with Digital Asset is a way to accelerate our own development plans and leverage their experience in this area."

"Partnering with SIX brings this cutting edge technology another step closer to commercial reality,” said Blythe Masters, CEO of Digital Asset. “We believe this collaboration will provide exciting opportunities for SIX and its customers while reducing inefficiency, cost and risk in the financial services ecosystem."