Mondelēz International to Join Hedera Council + More Crypto News

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Mondelēz International to Join Hedera Council

The Hedera Council, a consortium of over 30 diversified organizations governing the Hedera network, today announced that Mondelēz International has joined the Council, according to the press release shared with Cryptonews.

Mondelēz International is a multi-national food company with massive global and local brands such as Oreo, Ritz, LU, Clif Bar, Tate’s Bake Shop biscuits and baked snacks, Cadbury Dairy Milk, Milka, and Toblerone chocolate.

The company operates in over 80 countries, employing 91,000 people worldwide.

As a member of the Hedera Council,

“Mondelēz International […] is working to develop innovative, distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based solutions on Hedera, initially focused on digital transformation initiatives, supply chain management, and enriched business processes to enable enhanced customer experiences.”

One example is showcased in Mondelēz’s current work with fintech and payments platform company SKUx. The announcement said that SKUx and Mondelēz are expanding a customer service program by adding a near real-time SKUx digital payment option alongside coupons, mailed paper checks, and vouchers.

Per the press release,

“The next-generation use case leveraging Hedera will serve as the first real-world adoption of DLT to track the supply chain of consumer-packaged goods (CPG), digital payment-based offers.”

Xiang Xu, Global COE Leader of Digital Strategy and Blockchain at Mondelēz International, commented that “the potential to solve longstanding retail industry challenges for consumer-packaged goods companies and merchants is very compelling.”

Bill Miller, co-chair of the Membership Committee for the Hedera Council, stated that together, the partners are “spearheading relevant business solutions for the greater CPG and retail ecosystem.”

Fetch.ai Foundation Welcomes Deutsche Telekom as First Corporate Partner

Deutsche Telekom, one of the world’s leading integrated telecommunications companies and the largest telecommunications provider in Europe by revenue, has partnered with the Fetch.ai Foundation.

It is the first corporate partner to collaborate on advancing state-of-the-art AI and Web3 technologies within the Fetch.ai network, according to the press release.

It stated that,

“This partnership aims to revolutionize industrial applications by leveraging AI-driven autonomous agents and blockchain integration to streamline processes and enhance security across sectors like healthcare and automotive.”

The Fetch.ai Foundation is a non-profit organization established in the Netherlands by Bosch and Fetch.ai. It advocates for an open platform accessible to a diverse user base.

Deutsche Telekom’s subsidiary MMS takes on the role of both a member and validator, bolstering network security for the decentralized Fetch.ai blockchain, operating on the Cosmos protocol, said the Foundation.

Merging blockchain and AI is a pivotal moment in industry evolution, the announcement said. It unlocks new possibilities and collaborative innovations.

“By combining secure data transmission with AI capabilities, blockchain technology enriches AI functionality, enabling informed decision-making and facilitating a decentralized internet (Web3) that prioritizes user privacy and control,” the Fetch.ai Foundation concluded.

Taurus and Lido Enable stETH Custody and Staking Amid Demand from Banking and Corporate Clients

In other crypto news, global digital asset infrastructure provider Taurus today announced a strategic partnership with Lido Protocol, the middleware liquid staking solution for Ethereum.

Taurus will integrate Lido and add custody and staking support for staked Ethereum (stETH) to Taurus-PROTECTTM, the banking-grade custody solution, according to the press release.

Taurus has also expanded Taurus-EXPLORERTM, its blockchain connectivity infrastructure, including nodes and indexing, to support the Lido middleware.

Per the announcement,

“In response to growing institutional demand, Taurus’ clients will gain access to Lido’s liquid staking middleware solution, allowing them to stake their Ethereum and access rewards while still using stETH for other on-chain activities, including liquidity pool swapping (to exchange stETH for ETH).”

Marin Tvrdić, a prominent Protocol Relations enthusiast and contributor who actively supports liquid staking technologies like the Lido protocol, commented that the integration combines the benefits of liquid staking with a banking-grade custody solution to help bridge the DeFi-TradFi gap. “This integration addresses issues of security and liquidity by ensuring assets are protected and easily accessible to make DeFi more appealing to everyone,” Tvrdić said.

Vassili Lavrov, Head of Product at Taurus, added that liquid staking “solves several pain points” associated with Ethereum native staking. This includes high barriers for investors and locked liquidity.

Taurus serves as the trusted platform for Europe’s largest financial institutions and corporate firms, the announcement said. Over half of Switzerland’s banks that provide digital asset services rely on Taurus infrastructure.

Meanwhile, the Lido protocol programmatically solves problems associated with native ETH staking, such as illiquidity, accessibility, and dealing with hardware.