The Japanese Bankers Association (JBA) last week announced its plans to build a blockchain-based system that will act as a “common basis” for members to experiment with the technology, Nikkei reported.

In March, the JBA revealed its intention to build a platform for major and regional banks by the end of 2017, in order to conduct blockchain tests together.

According to the latest announcement, the JBA, in collaboration with FinTech ventures, IT operators and other banks, “decided to proceed with consideration for the development of "Block Chain Cooperation Platform" (tentative name) as a collaboration/cooperation type demonstration experiment environment” (Google translated).

It further stated that the latest decision is based on the recommendation of the “Study Group on Possibility of Utilizing Block Chain Technology and Issues”.

The JBA said that the system will enable it to utilize blockchain or distributed ledger technology (DLT) in areas including settlement and remittance service, identity verification and know your customer (KYC), financial infrastructure, and much more. It will facilitate blockchain-based trials and demonstration experiments to develop new financial services and to share knowledge of DLT across the banking industry.

The first trials of the blockchain-based system are expected to start this fall and the JBA will contact tech companies for the trials.