case study

BitStone Delivers Innovative DRT Platform for Cerchia

Cerchia is a Swiss fintech company specializing in Direct Risk Transfer (DRT) by leveraging a decentralized platform to ensure transactions are efficient, transparent, and secure.

BitStone developed a cutting-edge platform for Cerchia to revolutionize natural event risk transfer in the financial services industry.

The Challenge

Cerchia aimed to transform the traditional event risk transfer process, which often involves multiple intermediaries, high costs, and a lack of transparency. The conventional system relies heavily on intermediaries like banks, insurance companies, and legal entities to manage risk agreements and payouts, leading to increased transaction costs and delays. Additionally, the lack of transparency in these processes often leaves stakeholders with limited visibility into the terms and execution of risk transfers, fostering mistrust and inefficiency.

Cerchia wanted to address these inefficiencies and meet the needs of various target users, including insurance companies, brokers specializing in parametric insurance, asset management firms, and companies seeking asset protection.

To overcome these obstacles, Cerchia wanted to create a solution that could:

  • Reduce dependency on third parties in risk transfer agreements, thereby reducing costs and streamlining the process.

  • Enhance transparency by providing clear, immutable records of all transactions and agreements and giving all parties confidence in the fairness and accuracy of the process.

  • Automate and simplify processes by implementing a system that could automatically execute risk transfer agreements and trigger payouts based on predefined conditions without manual intervention.

  • Scale efficiently to accommodate a growing number of users and a diverse range of risk types, ensuring long-term viability and adaptability to market needs.

The Solution

BitStone partnered with Cerchia to develop a cutting-edge platform tailored to the needs of their DRT operations. This platform leverages smart contracts and blockchain technology to automate risk transfer agreements and trigger payouts based on predefined conditions, such as specific natural events. The solution also incorporates cryptocurrency for secure financial transactions, supported by a robust cloud infrastructure to ensure scalability and reliability.

The team, composed of 6-8 experts in blockchain, smart contracts, cloud technologies, Node.js, React, and database management, operated in an Agile SCRUM framework with 3-week sprints, leveraging Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Delivery (CD) for rapid development, testing, and deployment.

Technologies

Smart Contracts & Blockchain

Automate risk transfer and payouts based on triggers like earthquakes.

Cryptocurrency

Enables secure transactions using crypto wallets like Metamask.

Cloud Infrastructure (AWS)

Amazon EKS, Amazon S3, and DynamoDB.

Backend

Node.js, GraphQL, Redis.

Database

PostgreSQL.

Benefits

Increased Efficiency

he platform automates risk listing, investor matching, and transaction management, saving time and resources.

Reduced Costs

The solution eliminates intermediary fees, potentially leading to lower transaction costs.

Enhanced Transparency

Leveraging blockchain for secure and transparent risk transfer agreements.

Improved Scalability

The solution is designed to handle a growing user base and future risk types.

Innovative Solution

Provides a novel approach to natural event risk transfer in the financial services industry.

Resource optimization

Utilizing Amazon EKS optimizes resource allocation by scaling the Kubernetes cluster based on actual workloads.

Infrastructure as Code

The IaC with Terraform enables cloud-agnostic infrastructure management, improving portability for future migrations.

Live Application

The platform is operational with initial user adoption and data volume is gradually increasing.

Security Considerations

Security was prioritized throughout the development and deployment of Cherchia’s platform to ensure the highest level of protection for users and their transactions. Key security measures implemented include:

ISO 27001 Certification

Adhering to best practices for information security management, ensuring comprehensive protection of data and systems.

AWS Security Hub

A centralized system for monitoring security findings, enabling proactive threat detection and mitigation.

mTLS

mTLS (mutual TLS)

Encrypting communication between services with mutual authentication for enhanced security.

Tetrate (Zero Trust)

Enforcing a zero-trust security model that verifies all communication channels before granting access, ensuring strict control over network interactions.

PeckShield Audit

An external security audit identified and addressed potential vulnerabilities to ensure robust security in the platform's core functionality.

Key Insights

The collaboration between BitStone and Cerchia has resulted in a groundbreaking platform that simplifies natural event risk transfer.


With its secure, transparent, and scalable architecture, the platform sets a new standard for efficiency in the financial services industry.

Let’s work together!

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