In another sign that China is nearing the launch of its much anticipated digital yuan, the country’s central bank has partnered with ride-hailing behemoth DiDi. 

China’s answer to Uber, DiDi is currently the world’s second highest valued unicorn startup, worth some $56 billion USD, and backed by international tech giants including Apple, Alibaba, and Tencent. 

The company says it now has 550 million users across Asia, Latin America, and Australia, and also plans to launch an autonomous vehicles division and get over a million self-driving cars onto the road by 2030. In fact, in June, the company launched its on-demand robotaxi service in Shanghai. 

By entering a strategic partnership with DiDi, with a view to designing and implementing pilot projects, the Digital Currency Research Institute of the People’s Bank of China (PBoC) is signalling it is transitioning into what could be the final phases of testing before a general rollout. 

Although, despite the partnership with DiDi, and pilot projects in the cities of Shenzhen, Suzhou, Xiongan, and Chengdu, the PBoC still hasn’t revealed a release date for the digital yuan.

AYO.NEWS says:

Given the scale of DiDi’s operations, covering essential daily services like transport, the PBoC’s partnership with the company seems to suggest the digital yuan project is pretty much set from a technical point of view, and is ready for mass real-world testing. 

And, with the rest of the world, and especially arch-rival the United States, still distracted by the COVID-19 crisis, China seems to be building a lead when it comes to the Central Bank Digital Currency field, and public blockchain infrastructure in general. 

Only last week authorities in Beijing published the Beijing Blockchain Innovation Development Action Plan 2020-2022 – a 20-point plan to encourage the development and deployment of distributed ledger technologies. 

‘AYO.NEWS says’ features the opinion of the author and does not necessarily reflect the views of Pentagon Digital Limited or its affiliates or associates. 

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