GroundX and Consensys Collaborate on Bank of Korea's Digital Currency Project

The customer in this case is the Bank of Korea, the central bank of South Korea. The bank was looking to develop a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) as part of a pilot project. The project aimed to create a digital version of the Korean Won with advanced features such as cross-border payments, offline payment, and integration with digital asset systems. The bank chose GroundX, a blockchain affiliate of the nation’s tech giant Kakao Corp., as the preferred bidder for the partner position on its pilot digital currency development program.

The Bank of Korea was seeking a partner for its Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) pilot project. The project aimed to develop a digital version of the Korean Won with advanced features such as cross-border payments, offline payment, and integration with digital asset systems. The project was divided into two phases, with the first focusing on basic functionality such as creating, issuance, and redemption of the digital won, and the second phase exploring more advanced features. The challenge was to develop a secure, transparent, highly available, auditable, and efficient digital currency system that could handle both confidential wholesale transfers and scalable retail transactions.

GroundX, a blockchain affiliate of Kakao Corp., partnered with Consensys, a market-leading blockchain technology company, to work on the Central Bank of Korea CBDC architecture. GroundX developed Klaytn, a public blockchain with Ethereum compatibility, which was used in the project. Consensys provided its scalability rollup solutions and zero-knowledge proof frameworks to ensure the security and efficiency of the digital assets and transactions. The solution also leveraged Consensys Quorum's public-private blockchain interoperability for high interoperability and Consensys Codefi’s Payments platform, powered by AWS, for designing and building the digital currency settlement infrastructure.

• The collaboration between GroundX and Consensys resulted in the development of a secure and efficient digital currency system for the Bank of Korea. The system leveraged GroundX's Klaytn, a public blockchain with Ethereum compatibility, and Consensys' scalability rollup solutions and zero-knowledge proof frameworks. The solution also utilized Consensys Quorum's public-private blockchain interoperability and Consensys Codefi’s Payments platform, powered by AWS, for designing and building the digital currency settlement infrastructure. This resulted in a digital currency system that could handle both confidential wholesale transfers and scalable retail transactions, meeting the Bank of Korea's requirements for its Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) pilot project.

• The project is expected to last for 10 months, divided into two phases.

• The first phase of the project, running from August to December 2021, focused on basic functionality of the digital currency.

• The second phase, starting in early 2022, aims to explore advanced features of the digital currency.