The United Services Automobile Association, a San Antonio, Texas based financial services company catering to the serving and retired members of the United States Armed Services has started exploring the potential usage of Blockchain technology for its operations. The company hopes to decentralize its back office operations using the technology that powers the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Blockchain technology is already being used in various sectors including human resource, medical record keeping and proof of existence document management systems. The company, United Services Automobile Association (USAA) has multiple portfolio subsidiaries under it operating in banking, insurance, investment and financial planning, travel and real estate domains. The company employ about 30,000 people spread across nineteen locations. USAA has over 10.7 million customers and manages about $213 billion worth of assets.
According to the Alex Marquez, Managing Director of USAA – The institution is not interested in using bitcoin or any other form of cryptocurrency but they are fully invested in finding ways to use Blockchain technology in their operations. USAA has dedicated considerable amount of manpower to find Blockchain oriented solution for their business.
USAA is not the first financial institution to dabble with Bitcoin technology. Many large banks and financial institutions are internally working on projects to understand the current Blockchain technology and how it will evolve as the time progresses. Going by the rate at which these developments are happening, it won’t be surprising to find a concept solution for the banking industry available by the end of this year.
The company is not new to the Bitcoin businesses as it has already invested in Coinbase earlier this year. Coinbase offers a wide range of Bitcoin based services including bitcoin exchange and wallet services.