Case Study: Unionbank of the Philippines achieves nationwide financial inclusion and low-cost, near-real-time domestic remittances with Kaleido

An Enterprise Ethereum payment network driving financial inclusion in the Philippines through cheaper and more efficient domestic transactions

Unionbank of the Philippines confronted a major financial‑inclusion challenge: roughly 35 million Filipinos are unbanked and most rural banks are disconnected from electronic payment networks. To reach rural communities and reduce the cost and friction of domestic remittances, Unionbank partnered with ConsenSys Solutions and technology partners including Kaleido, using Kaleido’s enterprise SaaS private Ethereum platform to accelerate development of an inter‑rural bank payment network.

Using Kaleido to deploy a permissioned Enterprise Ethereum (Quorum) backend and tokenized Philippine Peso smart contracts, the project created an API‑connected platform that enables near‑real‑time, low‑cost interbank transfers, automates reporting/compliance and collapses 20+ legacy steps into a single workflow. Kaleido powered the private chain for a successful six‑month pilot; the platform secured Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas clearance, registered 130 rural banks for a Q1 2019 commercial launch with plans to onboard hundreds more, and achieved technical gains such as increasing single‑account throughput from about 25 to 250 transactions per minute.

Unionbank of the Philippines

Justo Aboitiz Ortiz

Chairman