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ArabianChain Technology, one of the most prominent names in the Middle East’s still-nascent homegrown blockchain industry, has formed a new alliance with Curiositas, a leading innovation firm based in Dubai and London. The two companies will now launch a joint venture to create Wethaq, a first-of-its-kind blockchain platform for Islamic capital markets.

Simply put, Wethaq will introduce the evolving concepts of smart contracts and legal automation in the realm of Islamic finance and banking. Once operational, it will serve as a PaaS or platform-as-a-service. The target market for the new platform includes investors, fundraisers, and of course, financial institutions.

Wethaq will be optimized to make pre-sale, management and secondary trading of sukuk products, and issuance more efficient, streamlined, and secure.

Speaking of the new venture with ArabianChain, Dimitrios Vourakis, Managing Director of Curiositas, said: “Our platform matters as there is an urgent need for automation and standardization in Islamic capital markets. Financial institutions, fundraisers, and investors incur substantial operational costs and third-party charges in Islamic capital markets and face more complexity and intermediaries than those encountered in conventional markets. Wethaq separates the essential structuring services provided by financial institutions from additional services such as custodianship, and payments, and offers the latter on its automated platform.”

The joint venture will see the two companies deploying Curiositas’ expertise in financial engineering and legal automation along with ArabianChain’s Distributed LedgerTechnology (LT) Protocol and smart contract technology to accomplish its stated objectives.