Today the InterWork Alliance (IWA) announced it is merging with the Global Blockchain Business Council (GBBC). The IWA launched just over a year ago to focus on the Token Taxonomy Framework (TTF), which was initiated by the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance.

The goal is to enable organizations to adopt tokenized assets and distributed business models, but standards are needed to avoid everyone doing their own thing. For example, a sustainability working group focuses on standardizing carbon offsets, a topic where blockchain is getting considerable attention. And another group covers trade and electronic bills of lading, an area where others are also developing standards.

“From carbon credits, to collectibles and insurance certificates, business across industries are realizing the broad applicability of digital tokens to provide more transparent and secure infrastructures,” said Accenture’s David Treat and GBBC Board Chair.

“The IWA joining forces with the GBBC is a significant move that will accelerate co-innovation in the open standards development community, allowing our clients to adopt digital tokens faster, with greater consistency and confidence.”

In 2018 the Post-Trade Distributed Ledger Group also merged with the GBBC, which says it now has more than 330 institutional members. The current IWA board of directors, which includes Accenture’s Treat, will lead the IWA Council as part of the GBBC and two staff members also moved across to the GBBC.

Last year saw a substantial number of new associations forming in both the blockchain and digital credential sectors, so consolidation is unsurprising.