On Sept. 19, Stripe announced the additional funding was sourced from investors including venture capital firms General Catalyst, Sequoia and Andreessen Horowitz.
Online payments processor Stripe has raised another $250 million in a new funding round, which pushes its pre-money valuation to a whopping $35 billion.
Coming from a $9.2 billion valuation in 2016, San Francisco-based Stripe was valued at $22.5 billion after raising $245 million in the beginning of 2019. Overall, the U.S. fintech startup has raised roughly $1.2 billion since its inception.
Total funding in the billions
The company, also an official partner of Facebook’s cryptocurrency project Libra, said it will use the new funds to accelerate global reach, grow product offerings, and extend enterprise capabilities. Stripe added:
“With 5 out of 6 new internet users coming online from areas outside of North America and Western Europe, Stripe has invested heavily in expanding to new markets. Stripe recently launched in eight additional countries and will be expanding to more in the coming months; this will bring the total to 40 countries covering 70% of the global economy, with many more launches planned for 2020.”
John Collison, Stripe’s president and co-founder, said that – even in 2019 – less than 8% of commerce happens online, adding:
“We’re investing now to build the infrastructure that’ll power internet commerce in 2030 and beyond. If we get it right, we can help the internet fulfill its potential as an engine for global economic progress.”
Stripe’s lending service
As Cointelegraph reported on Sept. 8, Stripe announced the launch of its lending service Stripe Capital for internet businesses in the United States. The news release stated:
“Stripe Capital’s full integration with Stripe means there’s no lengthy application, eligibility is determined quickly, funds hit a user’s Stripe account the next business day, and businesses can repay as they earn. … In addition to serving Stripe users directly, Stripe will also extend Stripe Capital to its platform partners (such as online store builders and B2B SaaS companies), enabling them to offer their own business users access to smart financing.”
StrongSalt Raises $3M in Seed Round to Develop Encryption Platform-as-a-Service
Advisory firm Valley Capital Partners has invested $3 million into encryption platform-as-a-service StrongSalt.
Per a Sept. 26 press release, StrongSalt raised $3 million from Valley Capital Partners in a seed round to further develop its encryption platform designed for developers and enterprises. The startup aims to build an encrypted ecosystem, allowing individuals to keep personal data private and to defend against theft and fraud.
StrongSalt claims to be the first firm that provides an application programming interface (API) platform for developers to make existing applications and workflows privacy-enabled. The company plans to release its encryption API platform in the fourth quarter of 2019.
Industry’s interest in keeping data private
Today, Cointelegraph also reported that Overstock’s venture capital arm Medici Ventures made a $2 million investment into a startup to further creation of a decentralized ecosystem of digital credentials and blockchain-based self-sovereign identity networks.
Recently, leading communications and technology company Verizon was awarded a patent for using virtual subscriber identity modules (vSIMs) for customers’ devices. According to the filing, the company’s blockchain encryption technology ensures more security and the existence of only one copy of the vSIM on one device at a time.
Experts’ opinion on blockchain in data protection
In a dedicated analysis for Cointelegraph, Oleksii Konashevych wrote that a digital ID is necessary for certain activities on a federal level: registering a company, declaring taxes, voting, etc. At these moments, the ID must be verified with an acceptable level of certainty, which will be provided by blockchain and the infrastructure of trust service providers.
Speaking about personal data protection, Timothy Paolini, board member, NYU Blockchain, told Cointelegraph:
“Blockchains are built around the principles of decentralization, removing the single point of failure risk (think Equifax servers) and cutting out unnecessary third parties by establishing a more direct, peer-to-peer network. This also maintains your privacy and control of your data from third-party apps as data rests at the protocol instead of the application layer.”
