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Technology

Baidu puts ticketing at heart of blockchain launch

Chinese web search giant Baidu wants to revolutionise digital ticketing through the launch of its Baidu Trust blockchain-as-a-service (BaaS) platform.

Based on technology developed by the tech firm, which has over 800 million monthly active users, the open platform sets out to provide the most ‘user-friendly’ blockchain service.

The Beijing-headquartered company describes its BaaS service as a “efficient, low-cost traceability trading platform”.

Baidu Trust can be used for payments and settlements, and incorporate digital ticketing, bank credit management, exchange-traded securities, and other activities.

The company said the technology has already been applied in asset securitization and exchange, and claims it has contributed to the “first asset-backed securities exchange products using blockchain technology in China.”

With the move, Baidu follows Chinese internet conglomerate Tencent, which is part-owner of the Maoyan Weying ticketing platform, in launching its own suite of blockchain services. In October 2017, Baidu Financial joined the Hyperledger project, which explores a variety of distributed ledger technology use cases.

Baidu, which began accepting bitcoin payments as long ago as 2013, had revenues of $10bn (£7.8bn/€8.8bn) in 2016.

IMAGE: Pixabay