The financial messaging company said that the trials will test a multi-bank standard with an objective to enable corporate treasurers to initiate and track gpi payments to and from various banks and integrate gpi flows in ERP and Treasury Management Systems.

The banks and other institutions taking part in the trials include Airbus, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Microsoft, BBVA, BNP Paribas, Citi, Deutsche Bank, General Electric, IATA, Standard Chartered Bank and others.

SWIFT said that ever since its launch in 2017, gpi has been a game changer and currently includes some of the largest global transaction banks among its more than 180 members. The aim of the gpi initiative is to modernize the cross-border B2B payments experience, said SWIFT.

The company said that cross-industry collaboration is crucial, as shown by the Corporates pilot which recently brought 10 multinational corporates and 12 gpi banks under one platform to study how best to deploy real-time payments tracking into corporate treasury applications.

SWIFT corporates global head Marc Delbaere said: “For the corporate treasurer dependent on more than one bank or branch for its cross-border payments (often called multi-banked corporates), this experience is rarely consistent, fast or efficient.

“The pilot has brought us together to design, build and now test a new standard which we believe will significantly improve this multi-bank capability and address the need for clear, immediate and trackable information in the corporate treasury space.”

SWIFT said that in the lead-up to the pilot testing phase, it has facilitated a number of co-creation workshops with banks and corporates. It added that the pilot inputs support FIN & ISO 20022 standards to enable corporates to access their payments status across SWIFT and bank proprietary channels.

Microsoft group treasury manager Lisa Wagner said: “The ability to access a greater level of payment information in a timely manner through SWIFT gpi will bring immediate benefits to our payments experience with greater transparency and responsiveness to our vendors.

“Providing multi-bank information all in one place and in the same format fits into our modern finance roadmap.”