Deutsche Telekom, Alibaba Cloud, Citi Join Hyperledger Blockchain Project

Blockchain consortium Hyperledger is continuing its rapid expansion by adding 16 new members.

Some 16 new members were announced Wednesday at the Hyperledger Global Forum in Basel, Switzerland, including cloud computing firm Alibaba Cloud, a subsidiary of the global conglomerate; financial services giant Citigroup and its Citi Ventures arm; trade finance blockchain platform We.Trade; and Deutsche Telekom, the largest telecommunications provider in Europe.

The consortium's newest members also include Guangzhishu Technology, Guangzhou Technology Innovation Space Information Technology, KEB Hana Bank, HealthVerity, MediConCen, Techrock, Xooa and BlockDao, Hyperledger said.

With the latest additions, Hyperledger has grown to more than 260 members.

In a statement, Hyperledger executive director Brian Behlendorf said the additions prove that interest in the blockchain space continues to grow, adding:

"The growing Hyperledger community reflects the increasing importance of open source efforts to build enterprise blockchain technologies across industries and markets. The latest members showcase the widening interest in and impact of DLT and Hyperledger."

John Calian, a senior vice president at Deutsche Telekom and head of its R&D unit T-Labs, said building a roaming application on Hyperledger's Fabric was "a natural choice."

He added that businesses in particular benefit from using an open source, permissioned platform such as one based on Fabric, as it provides a production-ready ecosystem ideal for groups with multiple stakeholders.

Hyperledger has been steadily adding new members in recent months, as well as publishing tools for developers to utilize its software.

Earlier this month, the consortium released a cryptographic library, called Ursa, to help blockchain developers more easily create implementations while cutting down on bugs.

Deutsche Telekom logo via r.classen / Shutterstock