Ripple, the global provider of financial settlement solutions, today announced the addition of seven financial institutions to its growing network. Santander, UniCredit, UBS, ReiseBank, CIBC, National Bank of Abu Dhabi (NBAD), and ATB Financial are among the latest banks to adopt Ripple to improve their cross-border payments.

“We’ve reached a tipping point where financial institutions are moving beyond blockchain experimentation and projects to real world applications that are driving significant bank-to-bank volume,” said Ripple CEO and co-founder Chris Larsen. “This is a major step forward for the global financial system, and as the Ripple network grows, together we are paving the way for new connected commerce opportunities and growing demands for real-time, high volume, low value global payments.”

These leading banks are taking advantage of Ripple’s distributed financial technology to drastically reduce the time and cost of settlement and enable new types of high volume, low value global transactions. While the use cases vary by geography and business objective, the majority of these financial institutions have successfully transferred actual money via Ripple, and all are aiming to implement the technology in commercial production.

“Blockchain and related technologies are a paradigm shift from the status quo and increasingly a major focus of innovation for us,” said Paolo Cederle, CEO of UniCredit Business Integrated Solutions. “That’s why we’re committed to moving beyond the lab and testing environments. Through our partnership with Ripple, we are optimizing our global payments and one of the first major banks to implement distributed financial technology in a commercial setting.”

As the only provider of enterprise blockchain solutions, Ripple’s growing, global network includes 12 of the top 50 global banks, 10 banks in commercial deal phases, and over 30 bank pilots completed, among many others also using Ripple’s solutions.

Today’s news follows Santander UK’s announcement last month that the bank has introduced a Ripple-powered mobile app that is available to employees within a staff pilot. The app allows cross-border payments between £10 and £10,000 to be made at any time of the day, with the funds appearing in the recipient’s account the next working day. Santander intends to expand the technology at a later date.

Several of the banks also commented on their use of Ripple technology:

“Using blockchain technology, ATB Financial became the first financial institution in Canada to complete an overseas payment in a matter of seconds,” said Curtis Stange, ATB’s Chief Strategy & Operations Officer. “Without blockchain, that transaction would have taken two to six business days. Blockchain is transforming the way we store and move value. While there’s still a great deal to learn, the transaction we performed proves we can significantly reduce the time it takes to move money across borders. This could revolutionize banking for our customers.”

“NBAD is continuously exploring opportunities to provide exceptional customer experience. Blockchain and distributed ledgers will enable our clients to seamlessly send payments across our network in the most efficient and cost effective way,” said Ramana Kumar, Managing Director & Head of GTB Business and Product Management at NBAD. "Ripple will enable our clients to access a wider network more efficiently and with full visibility and transparency.”

“Distributed ledger technology has the potential to transform the financial industry and greatly improve our client experience by making it easier and faster to move money globally,” said Phil Griffiths, Senior Vice President, Global Transaction Banking at CIBC. "Working with partners like Ripple, we are excited to be collaborating on this journey to be at the forefront of these innovative new developments for our clients.”

To learn more about Ripple’s solutions and relevant use cases for financial institutions, please visit Ripple.com.