The University of British Columbia and blockchain company use rootchain smart contracts to develop ownership transfer applications

The mainstream media is paying close attention to the ways blockchain could disrupt business processes, and now its use has expanded to how local municipal governments manage land titles.

UBITQUITY, a startup developing blockchain land titling solutions, recently joined the blockchain research collaboration at the University of British Columbia (UBC), a world-renowned comprehensive research university, to develop blockchain and title record solutions.

Nathan Wosnack, Founder of UBITQUITY, said:

“Our team had the pleasure of formally meeting Victoria Lemieux (Associate Professor of Archival Studies, ISchool Program, University of British Columbia) at a World Bank event in March of this year, and we have been working with her and her research team ever since.”

UBITQUITY also recently appointed Joe Lamontagne from Priority Title & Escrow as their advisor.

UBITQUITY provides a way to transfer deeds through a software-as-a-service (SaaS) blockchain platform. The startup hopes that real estate, title and mortgage companies can benefit from a clear record of ownership, reducing the time required for future title searches and increasing confidence and transparency.

The company’s newly restructured core team, which includes Marina Rezink as director and Nathan Wosnack as new founder and president, recorded a real estate title transfer on the blockchain in late June 2016.

Wosnack said:

“We have developed a viable record keeping system and are working with stakeholders in the private sector, such as title companies and new construction developers, because as you know, innovation often starts in the private sector and then the public sector follows. Ultimately, we decided to expand our vision and work with city and county record keeping agencies to record all public records related to title within their jurisdictions.

Wosnack believes that the Bitcoin blockchain has a clear lead over other blockchains .

“While we know there will be many excellent, trusted and creative innovations in the future that can provide customized, secure distributed solutions, the Bitcoin blockchain is the best and logically only choice for the functionality that our platform requires. UBITQUITY has also investigated the Ethereum blockchain and may consider using it in the future.”

Wosnack said:

“The distributed peer-to-peer nature of Bitcoin and the colored coins protocol API support we already have from Colu are both great. We are looking into integrating smart contracts, most likely using Rooststock (RSK) smart contracts.”

RSK is the first open-source smart contract platform that is bidirectionally pegged to Bitcoin and provides a merged mining model for Bitcoin miners to actively participate in the smart contract revolution. RSK aims to increase the value and functionality of the Bitcoin ecosystem by enabling smart contracts, nearly instant payments, and greater scalability.