Coloured coins startup Colu has revealed it is embarking on a partnership with multinational consulting firm Deloitte.
A Monday blog post from the Tel Aviv firm, which launched its open beta in August, said the collaboration will bring blockchain technology to “big new markets”.
Though details are scarce, the project will involve Rubix, the software platform that lets Deloitte clients build their own apps – including ticketing systems and registries – on the blockchain.
Amos Meiri, Colu’s CEO, told CoinDesk:
“For the last couple of months we’ve been meeting with Deloitte representatives and building a close relationship with Deloitte Canada and the Rubix team. As they started to work with some of their clients on different interesting use cases they needed our help with on the tech side and defining different PoCs [Proof of Concepts].”
In July, the ‘big four’ professional services firm revealed to CoinDesk it had found over 20 use cases for blockchain technology, having carried out research in the sector for over 18 months.
Besides Colu; Blockstream, Counterparty and Ethereum are known to be under testing at Deloitte, with some clients “still in the exploratory phase” and others further down the PoC pipeline.
Deloitte has also formed an 100-member group named the Deloitte Cryptocurrency Community across 12 countries, including Canada. It’s primary aim is to help banking and retail clients understand how the technology can disrupt legacy systems and create entirely new ones.
About Colu
Using the open-source protocol Colored Coins, Colu lets its users ‘colour’ a tiny fraction of a bitcoin with a specific attribute. This, in essence, ties it to a real-world asset while keeping bitcoin’s best attributes – including its cryptographic security and fraud-proof ledger. Users can issue and track their digital assets on its platform.
“It’s a method of attaching metadata to a blockchain transaction, it’s an abstract and generic way of extending the capabilities of a single asset blockchain while keeping the metadata secured and immutable,” Meiri said.
Colu is aiming to make the process more accessible to non-developers by hiding the technical nitty gritty and negating the need for its users to own bitcoin at all (Colu covers the cost of all transactions).
While there are templates for issuing things like securities, cryptocurrencies and tickets, users have the ability to create their own use cases. One example is the ‘Smart Lock’ created by Colu’s 13-year-old intern, Jonathan Ohayon, which demoed at Money20/20 this week.
Meiri explained:
“We wanted a smart door for our office and looked for solutions in the market that didn’t satisfy us, so then Jonathan just took our mobile app and API and connected it to our physical door … We can now give access easily to our office by sending a digital asset through the Colu app.”
In its three-month span, Colu has racked up more than 20 company integrations including music platform Revelator, Caribbean bitcoin exchange Bitt, and now Deloitte.
“It is fascinating to see how blockchain technology could be applied by different companies building different applications. We are following that diverse variety and are excited to discover the many use cases we haven’t even thought about,” the company’s blog post reads.
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