IBM China on Friday said it has completed a pilot project with Chinese credit card company China UnionPay that will help different banks to share loyalty bonus points and help credit card companies to increase customer loyalty.  

The pilot project is supported by block chain technology, Reuters reported.

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The block chain technology, which is one of the underlying technologies used in digital currencies such as bitcoin, is presently considered as one of the most relevant innovations in the financial services world.  

Bonus points at present cannot be freely exchanged among different banks, which adversely affect customer's loyalty to a specific card.

With IBM China's collaborative project with China UnionPay, this concern is expected to be addressed by allowing consumers across the world to exchange and trade bonus points from their "various banks in less than a minute to select rewards" they want.

The IBM and China UnionPay exchange seeks to include all types of loyalty programs, including air miles, supermarket reward cards, gas cards and mobile phone bills.     

IBM Research-China director and IBM Great China Group chief technology officer Dr. Shen Xiaowei said the company is also collaborating with Hyperledger Project to build a block chain platform that will help clients across the industry to improve their productivity.

Hyperledger is a cross-industry collaboration initiated by Linux Foundation to enable block chain-based applications to support several important functions including global business transactions, supply chain companies and financial services.    

TagsIBM, IBM China, IBM China and China UnionPay, China UnionPay, Block Chain Pilot Project, IBM China Unionpay Pilot Project