The pilot program partially conducted testing of the Retail CBDC’s end-to-end life cycle for real-value transactions, with industry participants acting as financial service providers, and whitelisted users and merchants.

The pilot, which was conducted from 15 August to 23 September 2022, covered three transaction types: issuance and redemption of CBDC between commercial banks and central banks; cross-border payment in local CBDC between commercial banks; and cross-border exchange of local CBDC against foreign currency CBDC between commercial banks. The 20 banks in the four jurisdictions used the mBridge platform to conduct 164 payment and foreign exchange transactions totalling over $22 million over six weeks, settled directly on the platform.

In the press release announcement, the central bank said "the BOT deems it necessary to extend the scope of Retail CBDC development to a Pilot phase in which real-life application of Retail CBDC will be conducted in cooperation with the private sector within a limited scale. The BOT will assess the benefits and associated risks from the Pilot in order to formulate related policies and improve the CBDC design in the future."

The Pilot will be separated into two tracks:

Foundation track will "assess the system’s efficiency and safety including the technological design." During this phase, CBDC will be used in conducting cash-like activities, such as paying for goods and services, within limited areas and scale of approximately 10,000 retail users selected by the BOT along with three companies. This phase is expected to begin at the end of 2022 and last until mid-2023. 

Innovation track will focus on "programmability which will facilitate the development of innovative use cases for CBDC, resulting in new financial services for a wide range of customers."  The private sector and the public will be able to participate in presenting business use cases for Retail CBDC via a "CBDC Hackathon". Those who wish to participate in the Hackathon can apply during 5 August – 12 September 2022. Selected participants will receive mentorship from experienced financial institution participants from Project Inthanon.

The central bank reiterated that it does not plan to issue Retail CBDC as "the issuance requires thorough consideration of benefits and associated risks for the financial system."

A prototype of multiple central bank digital currencies (mCBDCs) developed by the Bank for International Settlements Innovation Hub and the four central banks demonstrated the potential of using digital currencies and distributed ledger technology (DLT) for delivering "real-time, cheaper and safer cross-border payments and settlements".

According to the report, the enhanced prototype has the potential to offer various benefits to the participating central banks, including the ability to "manage the liquidity of their CBDC on the prototype, monitor the flow and the balances of their issued CBDC, enhance the level of privacy of the transactions, and automate certain compliance functions. Compared to the existing correspondent banking model, the prototype could substantially speed up cross-border transfers and reduce their costs."

Phase 3 of the mBridge project will involve "further experimentation with design choices and technology trade-offs and a future roadmap from prototype to a production-ready network that can serve the broader central banking community as a public good through open-sourcing."