Hong Kong’s Blue Cross Launches Blockchain Solution to Prevent Fraud

By Kapil Gauhar

A Hong Kong-based insurance company and a member of The Bank of East Asia Group, Blue Cross, has launched a blockchain-based solution with the aim of preventing fraud, speeding up medical insurance claims, and saving costs, as reported by South China Morning Post.

Patrick Wan, who is the managing director of Blue Cross, said that the Hong Kong-based firm would be able to cut the costs to a great extent since blockchain “eliminates the requirement to reconcile medical claim data across several parties.”

Wan stated –

“As part of its focus on insurance technology (also insurtech), Blue Cross has been investing 10 to 20% of its annual expenditure on information technology.”

As indicated by the details, the blockchain-based solution launched by Blue Cross is a permission-based network system which is based in Hyperledger technology.

William Yeung, the co-founder of a Hong Kong startup, MediConCen, developing blockchain-based medical applications, said that the new service would enable insurance claimants, as well as clinics, save a lot of time in Blue Cross’s network.

Yeung said –

“The efficiency and convenience of blockchain also means that more doctors, Chinese medicine practitioners and chiropractors who do not employ a lot of support staff for administrative work, could be attracted to the Blue Cross doctor network.”

In October 2018, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) had launched the official launch of a blockchain-powered trade finance platform, called eTrade Connect, which was developed by a consortium of twelve major banks in Hong Kong.