ATON will take part in the Bank of Korea's digital currency pilot, "Project Han River phase 2."
ATON said on the 18th that, following phase 1 of "Project Han River" led by the Bank of Korea, it signed a contract with NH Nonghyup Bank to build a "response system for Project Han River phase 2."
Project Han River is a digital currency infrastructure initiative pursued by the Bank of Korea together with the government, related institutions, and participating banks. Phase 2 aims to lay the groundwork for the full-scale introduction of the digital currency system and the commercialization of deposit tokens.
In this project, ATON will implement a merchant payment system that expands from some existing Hanaro Mart stores to all directly managed stores of NH Nonghyup Retail. It will also develop and apply infrastructure to pay the treasury subsidies pilot for building electric-vehicle charging facilities in deposit tokens, along with user-convenience features such as person-to-person remittances (linked with FDS), biometric authentication, automatic deposit token cash-in and cash-out, and innovative financial services.
ATON has strengths in building Blockchain-based digital currency and digital asset financial infrastructure, grounded in authentication and security technologies accumulated in the Fintech security field.
Based on phase 2, the Bank of Korea plans to push for the commercialization of digital currency infrastructure. The idea is to establish a low-cost, universal means of payment and expand programmable financial services to support the digital transformation of Korea's payment and settlement systems.
Woo Gil-su, ATON's chief executive, said, "The fact that we are carrying out the NH Nonghyup Bank system buildout in phase 2 following phase 1 of Project Han River is a result of recognition for our technological prowess and project execution capabilities," adding, "Through this project, we will solidify our technological leadership in the digital asset finance industry, which will take root as the next-generation financial infrastructure for traditional financial institutions."