Red Hat is looking to tap into the fintech start-up market with a blockchain initiative.
The OpenShift Blockchain Initiative is aimed at both fintech start-ups and financial services independent software vendors that are developing blockchain applications and technologies.
The initiative is designed to help financial services industry customers to build hosted blockchain solutions, as Red Hat manages container application deployment and support through OpenShift Dedicated.
OpenShift Dedicated was launched in December 2015 and has typically been used by container application platform customers. The offering provides the core OpenShift platform which is managed by Red Hat, in addition to open source Docker container and Kubernetes orchestration technologies.
According to the company, OpenShift Dedicated presents an ideal choice for start-ups in the blockchain space, fintech ISVs, and traditional financial institutions that are beginning to explore blockchain-based apps.
One of the reasons given for this is that these groups are able to explore blockchain-based cloud services through the use open source technology to develop updated transactional applications. The benefit of using open source technology is that developers can build in a more transparent way.
The offering from Red Hat uses container application platform technology to power blockchain solutions, something which the company says provides an applicable base across a wide range of industries, businesses and software systems.
The OpenShift Blockchain Initiative will allow ISVs to gain access to the Red Hat environment, training workshops, various materials and OpenShift Commons membership.
This isn’t the open source company’s first move in the blockchain market as it is already a participant in the Hyperledger Project, an open governance project that aims to advance blockchain technology through an open, decentralised platform.
Through this work the company is contributing to the development of distributed ledger technology.
Ashesh Badani, VP and GM, OpenShift, Red Hat said: "As enterprises begin to explore the use of blockchain application software, OpenShift Dedicated can provide a well-suited platform for a streamlined, more secure development environment."
Further work that the company has done in the space saw it add Ethereum development platform BlockApp to its OpenShift product. Ethereum is a development platform from the decentralised application studio ConsenSys.
Red Hat’s move comes a day after Microsoft struck a deal to work with the R3 consortium of around 40 banks to develop, test, and deploy blockchain technologies to modernise processes and streamline operations.
Both Red Hat and Microsoft will benefit from these moves as they both aim to boost blockchain use on their own platforms.
Tapping into the developer communities of blockchain, a technology which is gaining increased attention, is a good way for the two companies to increase their standing among developers.
