Last fall, blockchain payments company Ripple, in conjunction with Celent, conducted a survey to better understand payment services providers’ adoption of blockchain-based payments. The findings of that study are published in a report issued by Ripple, and illustrates how far the payments industry has come with regards to blockchain adoption, and what’s needed to keep the momentum going.

The study surveyed 1,050+ payment services industry representatives across 21 countries. Overall, it found that:

• 35% of respondents are in production of a blockchain payments solution
• 27% are nearing implementation of a blockchain-based payments solution
• 31% say that the blockchain offers the opportunity to expand existing services into new regions
• 71% are “very to extremely” interested in digital assets

Ripple indicated that leveraging the blockchain for payments has gained a significant amount of momentum thanks to its fair pricing for end consumers, attractive revenue for payments providers, and the overall level of trust placed in the technology.

Now all that’s needed is to pick up the pace of adoption– but what is holding back mass adoption of the technology? Ripple’s study identifies three drivers responsible for faster blockchain adoption:

Faster implementation

Payments companies are concerned about implementing a blockchain-based payments solution because they are worried it will be expensive and difficult to integrate into their existing platform. In fact, a third of respondents to the study cited implementation as a concern of using the blockchain for payments.

Regulation

When integrating new technology into existing platforms, regulatory hurdles are almost always a concern. With blockchain technology, however, this seems to be even more true, especially with legacy financial institutions. As one would expect, regulatory concerns of digital banking providers are less acute, since they are accustomed to operating using non-traditional models.

Digital assets

One of the top perceived benefits of using the blockchain for payments is the time savings. In fact, three quarters of the survey respondents were interested in leveraging the blockchain for digital assets in cross-border money transfers. Fueling this interest is the speed at which these transactions can occur when compared to traditional payments. The study found that early adopters of blockchain technology are most interested in using digital assets.