R3 project in recruitment drive as it looks to "change the world"

After a blog post by the managing director and CTO of the R3 blockchain project, which he titled "It's New Year... time to change the world", the initiative has embarked on a recruitment drive. R3, which is backed by 42 top-tier banks, is looking to hire talented developers, designers, and architects, in an effort to develop commercial applications of the technology being explored. The drive is also aimed at establishing consistent standards and protocols for the use of distributed ledger technology (blockchain) across the financial industry, which many have argued is a crucial task of the project. Indeed, reports have suggested in recent weeks and months, that although it now seems certain that the use of blockchain technology across the financial industry will become widespread, the speed and rate of adoption depends to a large degree on the success of the R3 project.

Bank-backed blockchain collaboration outfit R3 is in the market for talented developers, designers and architects capable of working on "some of the thorniest problems in financial technology".

Can you tell your nostro from your vostro?… and do you have an intuitive understanding of why it’s quite so hard to change anything in a bank?!

Do you understand why Bitcoin works the way it does?… and can you explain the block size debate in a way that all sides would agree was fair?

Can you explain why $100 at Chase is different to $100 at Wells Fargo?… and can you design a data model that reflects this reality?

Do you have a passion to transform the world of finance by applying insights from the worlds of cryptography, blockchain technology and distributed systems?

If you were building a system to enable multiple parties to come to consensus about the state of an agreement between them and maintain that in lockstep for the life of that agreement, what are some of the most important non-functional requirements you would want to explore to validate your design?

If you were building a shared ledger system between large numbers of regulated financial entities with hugely sophisticated IT infrastructures, what would be your approach to co-existence and integration?

What would be your answer to the CIO’s follow-up question? “Tell me… why did you build your shared ledger using a blockchain rather than another technology?”

The R3 project is seeking to develop commercial applications and to establish consistent standards and protocols for distributed ledger technology across the financial industry in order to encourage broad adoption and benefit from a network effect.Since its September 2015 launch, the company has seen a groundswell of interest in the consortium from financial services companies around the world, signing up 42 top tier banks to the initiative.In a blog post entitled 'It's New year...time to change the world' R3 managing director and CTO Richard Gendal Brown says the company is hiring "talented, motivated professionals to turn our vision into a reality".He says the consortium is looking for industry experts who have experience of banking technology and a passion for blockchain technology, asking:R3 has already established an Architecture Working Group and recruited ex-Barclays man James Carlyle as chief engineer, one-time Googler Mike Hearn as lead platform engineer, Cryptographer Ian Grigg and head of research Tim Swanson.Potential applicants for positions at R3 are invited to mail Gendal Brown and to give some though to "a few questions that just might come up in interview..."