WISeKey $WKEY Selected by Billon Group to Provide MPKI Services Allowing Trusted Remote Document Signing with Blockchain Technologies
Geneva – March 22, 2021 – WISeKey International Holding (“WISeKey,” SIX: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY), a leading cybersecurity, AI and IoT company, today announced that is has signed a collaboration agreement with Billon Group, a provider of the Unified Enterprise DLT (distributed ledger technology). The collaboration brings together Billon’s DLT system, often used for tokenizing and transacting national currency and processing sensitive data, and WISeKey’s Managed Public Key Infrastructure (MPKI) services to address complex security, privacy, and efficiency challenges in today’s global economic and social environment.
The agreement marks a significant advancement in trusted remote document signing, an approach increasingly important to businesses and organizations. The benefits of this collaboration agreement become even more important during the COVID-19 pandemic as many companies affected by the global shutdown are now struggling to build recovery strategies and governments are working to re-open their economies. Global e-signature market generated revenue of $951.3 million in 2019; this market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 24.6% from 2020 to 2030.
While many blockchain technologies advance the security of electronic transactions by making them immutable, most struggle to verify offline transactions, confer legal validity, and regulate digital signatures. Furthermore, most of existing blockchain technologies lack a consistent approach to ensuring the identity of the participants in a transaction.
WISeKey’s MPKI solution using trusted digital certificates is designed to bridge these gaps in blockchain implementations, and when used together with Billon’s Trusted Document Management solution, can deliver tangible business results, and solve legal validity issues by making offline validations possible (i.e., using standards like XAdES or PAdES). The combined solution offers digitally signed security to represent the Trusted Digital Identities of participants in the transaction, and it is scalable, interoperable, and legally binding.
“Current platforms for remote contract signing use email and SMS to identify parties. These do not provide an absolute guarantee that the contract is executed by the right parties. The identification methods used by Billon and advanced certificates issued by WISeKey, Billon’s trusted partner, give greater certainty and better audibility of the remote signing process. The remote document signing capability of Billon’s Trusted Document Management solution, which leverages the advantages of blockchain and PKI, can be successfully used to process all kinds of contracts in international trade, ensuring the highest level of data and document security,” commented Bogumiła Cebelińska-Woźniak, Trusted Document Management Product Director of Billon Group. “This integration is a practical proof point of the synergies that can be generated between blockchain and PKI, two technologies typically considered antagonists.”
Billion will use WISeKey’s WISeID platform as a MPKI solution to enroll users and generate valid digital certificates for document signatures, thereby enabling their DLT system to produce, when required in the transaction flow, legally binding proof points.
WISeID is based on the WISeKey/OISTE Root of Trust and integrates innovative technologies to distribute the identity attributes and build federated ecosystems.
“We are delighted by this opportunity to integrate our cutting-edge technologies to provide two vital features: (1) the required cybersecurity in the context of digital transformation processes and (2) a legal proof point via an electronic signature in line with the regulations to support compliance,” commented Carlos Moreno, VP Corporate Alliances and Partnerships of WISeKey. “This is a business information exchange built on revolutionary security of immutable blockchain data.”
About WISeKey
WISeKey (NASDAQ: WKEY; SIX Swiss Exchange: WIHN) is a leading global cybersecurity company currently deploying large scale digital identity ecosystems for people and objects using Blockchain, AI and IoT respecting the Human as the Fulcrum of the Internet. WISeKey microprocessors secure the pervasive computing shaping today’s Internet of Everything. WISeKey IoT has an install base of over 1.5 billion microchips in virtually all IoT sectors (connected cars, smart cities, drones, agricultural sensors, anti-counterfeiting, smart lighting, servers, computers, mobile phones, crypto tokens etc.). WISeKey is uniquely positioned to be at the edge of IoT as our semiconductors produce a huge amount of Big Data that, when analyzed with Artificial Intelligence (AI), can help industrial applications to predict the failure of their equipment before it happens.
Our technology is Trusted by the OISTE/WISeKey’s Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust (“RoT”) provides secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, for the Internet of Things, Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence. The WISeKey RoT serves as a common trust anchor to ensure the integrity of online transactions among objects and between objects and people. For more information, visit www.wisekey.com.
About Billon Group
Billon created a DLT protocol and system for national currency payments and document storage at scale, meeting all regulatory requirements and solving challenges for the wide adoption of blockchain technologies. With the protocol designed for high throughput and low cost of maintenance, our mission is to unleash the transformational capabilities of blockchain in the regulated world.
Billon provides client services for handling documents and regulated e-money on blockchain. The system also supports clients developing their own enterprise solutions in areas of Trusted Document Management, Regulated Digital Cash and Asset & Data Tokenization
Billon Group Ltd. was founded in the UK in 2015, following several years of R&D in Poland. Its unique DLT protocol has been supported by many R&D grants, including the EU Horizon 2020 program. Billon subsidiary companies are licensed to issue electronic money by regulators in the UK and Poland.
Billon’s growing partner list includes leading companies such as FIS, Raiffeisen Bank International and BIK (the Polish credit reporting agency). Billon has offices in London and Warsaw.
For more information, visit www.billongroup.com. Follow Billon Group on LinkedIn & Twitter & Facebook.
Press and investor contacts:
WISeKey International Holding Ltd
Company Contact: Carlos Moreira
Chairman & CEO
Tel: +41 22 594 3000
[email protected]
WISeKey Investor Relations (US)
Contact: Lena Cati
The Equity Group Inc.
Tel: +1 212 836-9611
[email protected]
Billon Group
Company Contact: Jacek Figuła
Position Chief Commercial Officer
Tel: +48501337926
Email [email protected]
Press contact from Billon Group
Contact: Maciej Józefowicz
Tel: +48 608 325 796
Email [email protected]
Disclaimer:
This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of article 652a or article 1156 of the Swiss Code of Obligations or a listing prospectus within the meaning of the listing rules of the SIX Swiss Exchange. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.
