GSBN advances testing of electronic bills of lading

Global Shipping Business Network (GSBN), a not-for-profit consortium enabling paperless shipping data exchange, has joined the Hong Kong Monetary Authority’s (HKMA) Project Ensemble in a move to accelerate the use of electronic Bill of Lading (eBOL) technology.

Specifically, the move allows Hong Kong-based GSBN to test its eBOL tokenization use case with Ant Digital Technologies, and to conduct interbank atomic settlement of tokenized deposits between the Hongkong Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC) and Hang Seng Bank (Hang Seng).

Project Ensemble is a new wholesale Central Bank Digital Currency (wCBDC) initiative established by the HKMA to encourage use cases from all sectors to build innovative financial market infrastructure (FMI) that enables the settlement of tokenised money and real-world assets (RWA) via a wCBDC.

Under Project Ensemble, eBLs are issued over GSBN’s blockchain infrastructure which also facilitates trade finance activities between corporates and financial institutions. These eBLs are tokenised by Ant Digital Technologies and wrapped on their own blockchain to enable trade finance payments to flow through via tokenised deposit and wCBDC.

The move comes as GSBN continues to forge an ecosystem of partners with global shipping lines, including COSCO Shipping Lines, OOCL, Hapag-Lloyd, and banks to issue eBLs over GSBN’s platform to offer greater efficiency, visibility, and potential financing opportunities to the customer. To date, over 14,000 customers have been onboarded globally and more than 300,000 eBLs have been issued and transferred on GSBN.

In another recent advance of that plan, GSBN in April said that the maritime freight carrier MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company would use its network to enhance safety in shipping lithium ion battery shipments.

Other recent eBOL initiatives include platforms available from supply chain visibility provider Project44, third party logistics provider C.H. Robinson, the National Motor Freight Traffic Association (NMFTA)’s Digital LTL Council, and an industry cooperative called the Scheduling Standard Consortium (SSC).