B3i, the Blockchain Insurance Industry Initiative, has announced the launch of market beta-testing of its reinsurance blockchain prototype.

The group of 15 global insurers and reinsurers participating in the B3i initiative has been working on a joint distributed ledger for reinsurance transactions driven by blockchain technology. The group for the first time publically showcased a fully functional beta-version of its integrated blockchain solution for the re/insurance industry at a conference in. Details of its vision, an industry business case and planned next steps were also shared.

The platform uses distributed ledger technology to enable secure, confidential and efficient transactions in a blockchain network. The short term focus of the platform is on handling reinsurance contracts.

The B3i team has also developed an industry business case for the platform across the whole value chain. The consensus amongst the companies is that a productivity gain of up to 30 per cent is achievable.

Paul Meeusen of B3i said: “I am really excited about our launch. Over the past four months, a dedicated, combined team drawn from B3i member firms has produced a working prototype covering the core functionalities required to enable a distributed smart contract management system for Property Cat XoL contracts.

“The deployment architecture is already close to a production-ready environment and the team is preparing for feature enhancements of the prototype and a first deployment into production in 2018.”

A market beta-testing programme for the prototype will start next month, with insurance industry participants invited to join the testing phase.

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