Microsoft patents a “Ledger-independent token service”

Microsoft has filed a patent for a so-called “Ledger-independent token service.” 

Microsoft’s token creation system

That is a computer system that can receive a request from a user to create a token on a network of distributed ledgers and provide the user with one or more token templates, each of which corresponds to a type of physical or digital asset, while also allowing the user to define a set of attributes and control functions. 

The system would then be able to create tokens on various blockchains depending on user requests. 

In other words, it could allow anyone to create their own token without having to write a smart contract but using predefined and parameterizable smart contract templates that can be used on different blockchains. 

In this way, not only could anyone create their own tokens, but they could also upload their smart contracts between different blockchains, letting the system do all the technical work. 

For example, the patent explicitly mentions Ethereum and Hyperledger Fabric (HLF), which makes it difficult to create applications that involve cross-chain token transactions or creating cross-chain logic related to tokenomics. 

Therefore, it would allow the creation of cross-chain tokens to be managed with a single user interface, even without having to know how the underlying blockchains work. 

The goal is to make token development more efficient for business use cases that involve going beyond the limits of a single blockchain. 

Citing an example that, however, has nothing to do with either Microsoft or this patent, Tether’s USDt is actually a cross-chain token because it is issued and runs on multiple blockchains (Ethereum, Tron, Omni, Solana, EOS, Algorand, Liquid, and SLP). Using a system like the one patented by Microsoft, Tether, for example, could manage all these tokens with a single user interface without worrying about the technical details. 

The usefulness of the Microsoft patent

In reality, the target to which this system hypothesized by Microsoft is addressed is probably not that of companies that already operate in the blockchain sector but of those who would like to enter it but do not yet have all the necessary skills to create and properly manage a cross-chain token. 

Moreover, it is quite useful to use a token on different blockchains, even simultaneously. In fact, today, the alternative is to create special wrapped tokens, with various risks due mainly to the various issuers. Instead, with a system like the one patented by Microsoft, a single issuer and original manager could actually issue the same token on different blockchains, perhaps even making it already natively cross-chain. 

Another advantage would be to manage the swaps of the same token on different blockchains more easily. For example, nowadays, it is not so easy to swap USDt on Ethereum for USDt on Tron, and vice versa, and you have to rely on third parties who have both tokens and are willing to swap one for the other for the same value. On the other hand, if the token issuer created an original platform that allowed users to swap a token with an equivalent one on any other of the main blockchains, the use of these multi-chain tokens would be even easier and more convenient. 

After all, the cryptocurrency industry’s general trend is to go from multi-chain to cross-chain, that is, to easily and quickly allow switching from one blockchain to another. For this reason, it’s not at all absurd to imagine that Microsoft can in the future really use this patent, perhaps becoming one of the protagonists of the cryptocurrency revolution, which for now is still only touching.