- The Tezos blockchain could end up powering the French CBDC offering
- Nomadic Labs, a Tezos-incubated project, has been chosen by CBDC contender Société Générale-Forge
- If the bank wins the tender, Tezos will have made a major breakthrough for blockchain technology
Tezos has been chosen as the platform to power one of the contenders for the French Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) contract. Société Générale-Forge, one of the eight projects shortlisted by the Banque de France in July, announced Wednesday that its CBDC project will be built in conjunction with Nomadic Labs, one of the Tezos stable of blockchain projects. Were Société Générale-Forge to emerge victorious from the selection process, there is the very real proposition of a public blockchain powering a national digital currency in the not too distant future.
#Tezos selected by @SocieteGenerale -Forge for its Central Banking Digital Currency experiment. Nomadic Labs is proud to contribute to this project. More info below:https://t.co/gpblNTYzVX
— Nomadic Labs (@LabosNomades) September 15, 2020
Nomadic Labs to Work With Société Générale-Forge
France has been arguably leading the way in the race to adopt a CBDC among European nations, with the French central bank heavily involved in testing the technology behind a potential sovereign digital asset. Two months ago the Banque du France released an eight-strong shortlist of contenders, one of which was Société Générale-Forge.
On Wednesday Société Générale-Forge announced that Nomadic Labs, a member of the Tezos ecosystem, would head up the pool of technology providers and advisors to their CBDC project. This will mean that the Tezos blockchain will power the Société Générale-Forge CBDC offering, which will undoubtedly be the biggest and most luxuriant feather in blockchain’s cap to date, with the idea of it potentially powering the French digital currency incredibly exciting.
Tezos “Fundamentals” Praised
In a press release announcing the news, Nomadic Labs said that the decision by Société Générale-Forge to choose Nomadic Labs and Tezos underlined the “quality of Nomadic Labs’ research and development teams, and the strong technical fundamentals of the Tezos blockchain.”
Regardless of whether Société Générale-Forge is chosen or not, the fact that they have plumped for Tezos at all is testament to how far the technology has come in recent years.
Should the testing on the Tezos blockchain prove successful, there is the very real possibility that it could end up being the backbone for France’s digital currency, a fantastic achievement for a project that began life in 2017 in such an acrimonious fashion, with lawsuits nearly splitting it apart at birth.
