China has gone international with its state-backed blockchain. Red Date Technology, the company behind the government-supported Blockchain-based Service Network (BSN), inked a deal with Singularity Innovations, a fintech from Dubai, to offer its DLT infrastructure in the Middle East and Africa.
The partnership includes the promotion of BSN Spartan Network by Singularity Finance, the Egyptian branch of Singularity Innovations. The Spartan Network is a non-cryptocurrency public blockchain infrastructure available only outside China. The platform, offering non-crypto versions of Ethereum, Cosmos, and PolygonEdge, was launched in September last year with HSCB among key companies running validator nodes.
According to the press release, "the BSN Spartan Network provides an infrastructure that integrates non-cryptocurrency public blockchains that can be used by any traditional IT system to leverage the capabilities of the underlying blockchain technology in an easier and more cost-effective way."
Launched in 2020, BSN was co-founded by China Mobile, China Unionpay, Red Date Technology, responsible for designing the network's architecture, and government agencies, with the aim of facilitating blockchain development for businesses and institutions. The DLT technology has become one of the top priorities for the Chinese government, with Xi Jinping describing it as an "important breakthrough in independent innovation."
In the last few years, the country has been pressing ahead with various blockchain initiatives despite its continuing crackdown on crypto. One of the latest examples includes the launch of the research network spanning businesses, think tanks, and universities, headed by the Beijing Academy of Blockchain and Edge Computing.
