WAVE BL, an electronic bill of lading (eBL) solution, has been adopted by the Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC). Following a satisfactory pilot, the development announcement allows all MSC customers to use WAVE BL. The partners have collaborated to develop a user-friendly interface that eliminates the need for shippers to change their processes.

@MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company, world’s second largest container shipper adopts Wave blockchain bills of lading🚀#Today Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) announced it has adopted the electronic bill of lading (eBL) solution WAVE BL.

More info✔️ https://t.co/rrcVb8ebe3 pic.twitter.com/PyNVOcR9df

— European Blockchain Convention (@EBlockchainCon) April 28, 2021

“MSC chose WAVE BL because it is the only approach that replicates the conventional paper-based method used in the shipping and cargo transportation industry,” says André Simha, MSC’s Global Chief Digital and Information Officer. “It offers a digital alternative to all of the options available with traditional print papers, but it is much quicker and more secure.”

Despite COVID-19, only 0.1 percent of bills of lading are issued electronically, according to Singapore’s Maritime and Port Authority (MPA). Since bills of lading indicate possession of the container, the sender typically sends the document to the buyer so that the container can be claimed when it arrives.

This is a challenge with the pandemic, and it’s also vulnerable to fraud because it’s paper-based. Instead, the electronic originals can be digitally encrypted and signed for electronic bills of lading, meaning that they can only be received peer-to-peer by the correct recipient.

MSC is a member of the newly formed Digital Container Shipping Association (DCSA), working on open source eBL standards. According to its report, if half of the industry adopts eBLs by 2030, it would save more than $4 billion per year. For quite some time, the container shipper has been looking into blockchain. It is a TradeLens member of IBM and Maersk. It took part in a trial using blockchain tokens for cargo release at the Port of Rotterdam last year.

This attempted to digitize the process to make it faster, more secure against fraud, and touch-free during the pandemic. Meanwhile, WAVE BL, one of the first business blockchain applications, has had a long journey.

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It was accepted into the Barclays Techstars accelerator in 2016. Israel’s ZIM containers, which began testing the solution in 2017, were among its first collaborators. Fonterra, a dairy company, collaborated with Wave and HSBC on eBLs. It also has a link to the Contour trade finance network.

Wave isn’t the only eBL option available. Bolero and essDOCS also have non-blockchain options. R3 has acquired Singapore’s E-Title Authority and is now beta testing the Corda eBL. CargoX has a blockchain solution as well. 
There are several standards programs in addition to the DCSA. One from the International Port Community Systems Association (IPCSA) and another from the Interwork Alliance concentrate on tokenization. The fact that bills of lading are used in trade finance is one reason for the interest in tokenizing them. Meanwhile, the MPA in Singapore has issued a request for proposals to build eBL solutions and promote industry adoption through consortia