The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, today is announcing new members from across the industry, a formal open governance structure and technical updates to the new Hyperledger Project.

The intent to form the Hyperledger Project, an open source project to advance the blockchain digital technology for recording and verifying transactions, was announced at the end of 2015. Founding members of the initiative represent a diverse group of stakeholders, including: ABN AMRO, Accenture, ANZ Bank, Blockchain, BNY Mellon, Calastone, Cisco, CLS, CME Group, ConsenSys, Credits, The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC), Deutsche Börse Group, Digital Asset Holdings, Fujitsu Limited, Guardtime, Hitachi, IBM, Intel, IntellectEU, J.P. Morgan, NEC, NTT DATA, R3, Red Hat, State Street, SWIFT, Symbiont, VMware and Wells Fargo.  

Global Business Leaders Contribute to Hyperledger

Since announcing the intent to form in December, the Hyperledger Project has received proposed code and technology contributions from several companies, including Blockstream, Digital Asset, IBM and Ripple. Other community members are contemplating contributions of their own.

As with all open source projects, technical contributions are welcome at any time, from anyone and will be reviewed by the newly formed Technical Steering Committee (TSC), which is comprised of industry-leading technical experts. The TSC is committed to open and transparent discussion, processes and decision-making. This group will oversee the project’s technical direction and working groups as well as manage multiple contributions to the code base. The TSC will be evaluating proposed contributions and go through an open community process to build out the initial and unified codebase.

Digital Asset has donated the trademark for the ‘Hyperledger’ name to the Linux Foundation. Use of the mark will be managed exclusively by the Governing Board of the Hyperledger Project with the approval of the Linux Foundation.

The Hyperledger Project is a collaborative effort to focus on an open platform that will satisfy a variety of use cases across multiple industries to streamline business processes. Peer-to-peer in nature, distributed ledger technology is shared, transparent and decentralized, making it ideal for application in finance and countless other areas such as manufacturing, banking, insurance and the Internet of Things. By creating a cross-industry open standard for distributed ledgers, virtually any digital exchange with value, such as real estate contracts, energy trades, marriage licenses, can securely and cost-effectively be tracked and traded.

“The Hyperledger Project has ramped up incredibly fast, a testament to how much pent-up interest, potential and enterprise demand there is for a cross-industry open standard for distributed ledgers,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director at The Linux Foundation. “Working on its own even the largest global corporation could not match the speed at which our new members are moving blockchain technology forward. Such a broad effort and investment is sure to have a great impact on our personal and professional lives.”

Members Adopt Open Governance Structure

The Hyperledger Project today is also announcing its ratified governance structure. A Board of Directors will guide business decisions, marketing and ensure alignment between the technical communities and members. Nominations are currently open for TSC members. 

To stay connected or to be part of the technical discussions, be sure to subscribe to the TSC or Technical-Discuss mailing lists atlists.hyperledger.org. Hyperledger Project is a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project.