NEWS
NEWS
NEWS
Bitcoin bonanza: cryptocurrency exchange service ShapeShift raises a $1.6m seed round
Cryptocurrency exchange service ShapeShift AG has raised seed funding of $1.6 million in a round led by Digital Currency Group and Roger Ver that included Bitfinex, Bitcoin Capital, Mardal Investments, along with Bruce Fenton, Trevor Koverko and Michael Terpin.
Founded in August 2014, ShapeShift enables the immediate exchange of digital assets including Bitcoin, other cryptocurrencies, and tokens.
Unlike others in the space the company doesn’t require users to have accounts, leading to what it claims are far faster, more convenient liquidity for digital assets, while vastly improving consumer protections; in offering a “non-custodial” account free environment it doesn’t hold customer funds, therefore providing protection from hacking.
“Most exchanges hold customer funds and extract personal information, which is an archaic and insecure model,” Founder and Chief Executive Officer Erik Voorhees told SiliconANGLE back in June. “Mt. Gox was a teachable moment for everyone in the Bitcoin community and ShapeShift has innovated these problems out of the picture.”
“We are both faster and more secure. This is real consumer protection—no funds or sensitive information is stored on our servers nor on the user’s phone in case it is damaged, destroyed or stolen. Digital currency has brought to humanity a more secure infrastructure, and so we build in that spirit.”
Numbers
Numbers for the ShapeShift are impressive given they’ve only just celebrated their first birthday: the exchange has registered 100 times growth in recent months, having achieved over the equivalent of over $2 million in trades in July.
Currently the site supports 40 leading digital currencies and assets including Bitcoin, Counterparty, Ripple, Monero, and Ethereum, with over 940 direct trading pairs supported, a number that is claimed to be more than any other exchange.
“ShapeShift demonstrated an entirely new way to think about asset exchange,” Bitfinex Director of Community and Product Development Zane Tackett said in a statement sent to SiliconANGLE. “It’s like Google Translate for digital currencies. We’ve known Erik for a while now and he’s knocked it out of the park with this one. We’re very excited about the partnership.”
Including the new round, ShapeShift has raised $2.39 million to-date.
The company said it would use the new funding to support development, improve liquidity and enable further scalability.
Image credit: ShapeShift/ screenshot
A message from John Furrier, co-founder of SiliconANGLE:
Support our mission to keep content open and free by engaging with theCUBE community. Join theCUBE’s Alumni Trust Network, where technology leaders connect, share intelligence and create opportunities.
- 15M+ viewers of theCUBE videos, powering conversations across AI, cloud, cybersecurity and more
- 11.4k+ theCUBE alumni — Connect with more than 11,400 tech and business leaders shaping the future through a unique trusted-based network.
About SiliconANGLE Media
SiliconANGLE Media is a recognized leader in digital media innovation, uniting breakthrough technology, strategic insights and real-time audience engagement. As the parent company of SiliconANGLE, theCUBE Network, theCUBE Research, CUBE365, theCUBE AI and theCUBE SuperStudios — with flagship locations in Silicon Valley and the New York Stock Exchange — SiliconANGLE Media operates at the intersection of media, technology and AI.
Founded by tech visionaries John Furrier and Dave Vellante, SiliconANGLE Media has built a dynamic ecosystem of industry-leading digital media brands that reach 15+ million elite tech professionals. Our new proprietary theCUBE AI Video Cloud is breaking ground in audience interaction, leveraging theCUBEai.com neural network to help technology companies make data-driven decisions and stay at the forefront of industry conversations.
