Yesterday Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) announced it has updated its Quartz solution to support central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). Quartz is TCS’s blockchain solution. For central banks, the update supports the life cycle of a CBDC, including issuance, executing and recording transactions. It is also designed to enable commercial banks to work with central banks for digital currency distribution.
The announcement is timely, given the Reserve Bank of India recently shared its digital rupee pathway to launching something within the next few months. However, TCS works with banks and central banks worldwide, and this offering is international. In fact, TCS BaNCS, its solution for market infrastructure and conventional custody is used by 50 institutions
“Central banks around the world are experimenting with CBDCs in their efforts to transform payments and settlements and create an open and safe monetary system that encourages innovation,” said Vivekanand Ramgopal, President, BFSI Products and Platforms, TCS.
Talking about Quartz, he said, “its co-existent microservices architecture enables financial institutions to introduce these next generation services even as they retain their existing systems.”
Quartz is a permissioned blockchain offering that supports multiple enterprise blockchains, including Hyperledger Fabric, R3’s Corda and permissioned versions of Ethereum. It provides gateway services for integration with other blockchains and legacy systems. TCS has developed several off-the-shelf Smart Solutions, including for rewards, loan securitization, markets for tokenized assets and cross border remittances. It also has a crypto custody solution integrated with Thales hardware.
