R3 Review: Ripple Labs (PDF) At R3 we are focused on building industry partnerships based on the premise that emerging technologies such as blockchains and distributed ledgers will positively transform the current industry-operating model. These technologies have the potential to deliver the benefit of improved security, controlled transparency and accessibility to both regulators and customers globally, while also substantially reducing costs and complexity for financial institutions. Conducting in-depth evaluations of the risks and benefits of existing solutions is a critical part of this approach.
Ripple Labs was a natural choice for our inaugural evaluation, as they have emerged as an early leader in the crypto-technology space, offering a production platform for lower cost global payments and settlement. Ripple has also focused on partnership rather than competition with existing financial institutions looking to improve transaction processes and gain efficiencies. As part of R3’s due diligence on the public Ripple network, we partnered with industry subject matter experts to do a technical review of the Ripple Protocol Consensus, which has provided the foundation for the findings cited this paper.