On Tuesday, Ripple announced several key partnerships in South Korea and Japan that are aimed at supporting crypto infrastructure for institutional adoption.

The major integration comes after a recently released verdict in the long-running US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) vs. Ripple lawsuit.

The blockchain firm is doubling down on programmability for the XRP Ledger (XRPL) dev ecosystem. Its native crypto, XRP, printed a green index in the 24-hour frame, suggesting the emergence of positive sentiments among investors.

Ripple partners with Futureverse

Brad Garglinghouse, CEO of Ripple, mentioned in an X post that the new programmability is in the works for the XRP Ledger. The XRP community had been asking for this for a long time. He added that they are looking for growth opportunities for Ripple’s enterprise products to serve crypto-native users.

AI and metaverse tech company Futureverse is joining hands with Ripple custody to safeguard its assets. The AI firm has already adopted the XRPL NFT standard and uses XRP as the gas token on the Root Network. It added that it has integrated with the XRPL DEX to supply network liquidity.

Ripple is on the ground this week in Korea and Japan, starting off with a few key announcements – all in service of the goal to strengthen the foundations of crypto infrastructure to support blockchain utility and usability for institutional adoption.

— Ripple (@Ripple) September 3, 2024

Ripple has posted that the XRP Ledger is designed to move value efficiently with rock-solid infrastructure like its native DEX, AMM, Escrow, NFTs, Authorized Trustlines, IOUs, and more. New features like Oracles, multi-purpose tokens, lending protocols, decentralized identity, and more are up for vote in XRPL’s decentralized amendment process.

It added that the extra programmability on the XRPL mainnet and through the EVM sidechain will bring the customizability that developers look for. This will act like the glue that binds native features with the flexibility to craft on-chain logic.

XRPL in focus

Ripple’s University Blockchain Research Initiative (UBRI) just welcomed Korea’s Yonsei University as its 58th global partner. The blockchain firm has committed $60 million to the UBRI program.

Ripple highlighted that the XRP community is committed to bringing new programmability to the table. This includes smart contracts to the XRPL dev ecosystem in 2025. It will be done through the XRPL EVM sidechain, which is already in the development stage. However, the company will also explore the native capabilities of the XRPL Mainnet.

XRP registered a surge of around 4% since these developmental announcements came out. XRP has already seen a fresh surge as the long-running case comes to a decisive end. XRP price jumped by 41% in the last 60 days, outperforming Bitcoin’s 9% gains. It is trading at an average price of $0.568 at press time.