Spain’s largest telecom brand dives deep into Web3

Telecom company Telefónica enabled payments with Bitcoin, Ether and other crypto for its online marketplace Tu.

With crypto adoption moving forward in various parts of the world, Spain continues to encounter major developments in its local blockchain space as its largest telecom services provider dives deeper into Web3 technologies.

Telefónica, the multinational telecom company based in Madrid, Spain, has enabled payments with cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), USD Coin (USDC) and many others on its online tech marketplace called Tu. The firm integrated a crypto payment feature provided by the Spanish crypto exchange Bit2Me to receive crypto in exchange for their tech products. The exchange teased the integration during its Telefónica Metaverse Day event.

¿Qué creéis que estamos preparando con @Telefonica? pic.twitter.com/cYijpO1Zyj

— Bit2Me (@bit2me) September 29, 2022

Apart from integrating crypto in its online store, the telecom firm has also recently announced its collaboration with the software company Qualcomm Technologies to advance its extended reality (XR) ecosystem and bring the Metaverse to life.

According to Daniel Hernández, an executive at Telefónica, their firm collaborated with Qualcomm to prepare for the future and build its infrastructure. This is to stay on top of developments so that they are able to provide innovative services to their customers.

Apart from its efforts in integrating crypto and building the Metaverse, the company has also dabbled in nonfungible tokens (NFTs). The firm has built and released its own NFT marketplace integrated with the crypto wallet MetaMask.

This is not Telefónica’s first encounter with blockchain technology. As previously reported by Cointelegraph, the firm announced an initiative that supported blockchain and artificial intelligence (AI) startups in 2019. The move aimed to enhance traditional ecosystems with emerging technologies.

In 2020, Telefónica collaborated with Deutsche Telekom and British provider Vodafone to test a blockchain solution to settle roaming discount agreements. The blockchain-based solution was expected to reduce the costs for the telcos and create more efficient settlement workflows for inter-company deals.