Crypto exchange Koinex to diversify into blockchain solutions for fintech, govt

Unsure about the future of cryptocurrency in the country, leading crypto-exchange Koinex is planning to get into blockchain solutions.

The Mumbai-based company is looking to provide blockchain solutions to banks and financial institutions soon and for this purpose, it has opened a new development centre in Bengaluru. It is also mulling a plan to expand its services in the global markets.

Backed by renowned VCs—Beenext (Singapore) and Pantera Capital (San Francisco)—Koinex will provide solutions to solve issues related to finance, payments, security and banking operations on a global scale.

Focussing on fintech

Koinex’s founder Rahul Raj told BusinessLine that the company will address issues such data fraud, lack of transparency, data tampering, high transactional fees and middleman interferences for financial institutions.

Quoting a recent Thomson Reuters report, Raj said that the global debt and equity capital markets were pegged at $5.3 trillion and $ 403 billion during the first nine months of 2018. “With such enormous size of these markets, there is a tremendous opportunity to solve issues like latency, reconciliation, access to capital and building of new financial instruments, all with the use of blockchain technology,” he said, adding that Koinex will focus on building the next-gen fintech solutions for the emerging digital world.

Besides, the it will provide blockchain infrastructure tools for product developers and designers who can easily build decentralised applications (or dApps) and push this technology to the masses.

The company, with the total workforce of 70, is looking to hire more people to meet these targets. “We plan to triple our workforce to be able to achieve these targets and will continue to focus on the exchange business alongside,” Raj said.

Koinex also plans to invest about $1 million in 2019 to build the blockchain ecosystem by conducting hackathons, DevCons and meetups to explore the various nuances of this technology.

Optimism

While Koinex plans to invest in core blockchain product development, the company’s core business, the crypto trading platform, is witnessing a slack following a global bearish market and uncertainty among the Indian regulators in coming out with a clarity around legality of cryptocurrencies. However, Raj said that the market is expected to witness some dramatic changes soon.

“Volumes have dried up for sure in the bearish market. In India, the trading activity has declined by 1/10th. But we are optimistic that things will change in the next 6-12 months,” Raj said and added that the Indian government has formed a committee to draft a bill on cryptos after which the Supreme Court is likely to give its final hearing on January 15.

The apex court is currently hearing multiple cases filed across various courts in the country on legality of cryptos by clubbing all of them into one.

COMMENT NOW