Western Union Piloting Settlement Tests with Ripple for USA-Mexico Corridor: WU General Manager

Back in December 2018, it has been revealed that Western Union has partnered with Ripple Labs. Reportedly, they have been testing xRapid, one of the products of Ripple to experiment the blockchain technology. Western Union had announced that “WU partnered with Ripple Labs to test whether sending payments by blockchain was faster and less expensive. The tests are ongoing.”

The Colorado-headquartered company has been in the financial space for over 168 years now. According to the recent interview of Molly Shea, general manager of Asia Pacific from Western Union said that the company is actually piloting settlements with Ripple.

“When you think about cryptocurrencies, if those start to take off, we need to be ready,” said Shea on the topic of cryptocurrency.

She says they need to be ready not only from the technology perspective but the regulatory got to be there as well. It is imperative to constantly be looking at the trends and what customers are looking for and what they need and be ready to meet those.

“We Western Union like to say we are the original fintech,” said Shea, being the 168 year young startup with a history that dates back to 1851. The focus of the Western Union is to constantly “reinventing the business,” as she states, “it is in our DNA to be disruptive.”

Becoming the Leader in Cross Currency Transfer

“Our vision is to be leader in the cross currency money transfer”, shared Shea while stating that it important to know when, where and how the customers want as she said, “We know, within disruption really lies the seed of opportunity.”

Talking about the importance of digital tech, she says it is really transforming the world and no one should be left behind. Though money transfer space is highly competitive she says it’s good for the overall industry.

Moving money with convenience, speed and reliability is the most critical thing and that could be why they have partnered up with Ripple as she states,

“We are piloting some settlement tests with Ripple for certain corridors, I think the US Dollar and Mexican Peso, is one example.”

She further explains that it is important the options that they choose are legitimate, and that they are widely acceptable for consumer use.

The idea is to stay ahead of the curve, declares Shea as they have also made an investment in digital currency group which is a fund that provides industry leading insights into blockchain and cryptocurrency space, which she says is exciting as it’s about staying knowledgeable about technologies and how they are applicable to what you want to do.