The United Nations Office For Project Services (UNOPS), a technical advisory arm to the United Nations, and IOTA have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to look into the ways in which IOTA’s technology can enhance the efficiency of the agency’s operations.

IOTA provides an open-source distributed ledger for data management. UNOPS said that IOTA’s distributed ledger would help in improving the efficiency in the management and tracking of UN documents, supply chains and transactional payments in real-time, with access available to both UNOPS and its partners.

“We share a vision where machines, devices, sensors and people connect and communicate to each other - it's the world of 'Industry 4.0.' Harnessing technology that allows for these processes to work simultaneously, without the need for intermediaries, will help expedite our mission as an organization,” said Yoshiyuki Yamamoto, UNOPS Special Advisor on Blockchain Technology.

The collaboration will be further extended to training workshops, thought leadership seminars, and the development of specific proof-of-concepts to bring greater efficiencies to specific areas of UNOPS work.

IOTA is the inventor of Tangle, which it describes as a “blockless distributed ledger which is scalable, lightweight and for the first time ever makes it possible to transfer value without any fees.”

“We are thrilled to begin working together with UNOPS and to tackle current and future challenges together. The IOTA Foundation is fully committed to putting the IOTA Tangle to work on behalf of important humanitarian and development causes,” IOTA Co-Founder Dominik Schiener said.

Earlier this year, Taipei City partnered with the IOTA Foundation, an open-source non-profit foundation, in order to drive the efforts towards reaching smart city goals.

IOTA is recently the tenth most valuable cryptocurrency by market cap. In February, Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC), the corporate venture capital arm of the Bosch Group, purchased IOTA tokens.