SBI Digital Community Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of SBI Group, and Ripple Labs have announced a strategic partnership to promote the use of the XRP Ledger within the Web3 community. According to an official press release on August 13, the collaboration will focus on integrating the XRP Ledger into the “Bto3Web3 community,” a digital platform managed by SBI Digital Community, to enhance its functionality and broaden its appeal.

“The XRP Ledger is a layer 1 public blockchain designed to enable fast, cheap, and sustainable payments. (…) Through this strategic partnership, we will expand the opportunities for individual users to use the XRP Ledger through the Bto3~Web3 community managed by SBI Digital Community, and work to popularize the XRP Ledger,” the statement said.

Ripple and SBI’s New Web3 Venture

SBI Digital Community will begin issuing Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) on the XRP Ledger. The initiative extends to creating a supportive environment for users to interact with these digital assets, from purchasing to trading on the platform.

This venture will be supported by xrp.café, a marketplace specialized in the distribution and exchange of NFTs hosted on the XRP Ledger. “As an issuance platform for NFTs on the XRP Ledger, we will use xrp.café, a marketplace specialized in the distribution and buying and selling of NFTs issued on the XRP Ledger,” the press release said.

To further highlight the potential impact of the partnership, the companies outlined plans to reward community creators and contributors in XRP. This reward mechanism is intended to incentivize and support creative and operational contributions to the platform. SBI revealed: “In addition, we will enable the payment of rewards to creators and other community contributors in the cryptocurrency XRP, based on their wishes.”

The announcement states the following about the goals of the partnership: “We believe that by increasing the number of users of the XRP Ledger, more businesses can offer new B-to-C services, increasing convenience in the real world.” The project has a capitalization of 50 million yen, which is equivalent to approximately $338,000, including capital reserves.

Notably, this partnership is not the first collaboration between SBI Group and Ripple Labs. The relationship dates back to 2016 when the entities founded SBI Ripple Asia, a venture aimed at revolutionizing cross-border payments in Asia with Ripple’s blockchain technology.

Additionally, SBI Holdings has previously integrated the XRP Ledger into several projects, demonstrating the versatility and robustness of the ledger. Notably, SBI has used the XRP Ledger for NFT issuance during major events such as the World Expo 2025 and has explored its application in supply chain solutions in Japan in partnership with HashKey.

At the time of writing, XRP was trading at $0.5673.

Main image created with DALL.E, chart from TradingView.com