Founded in 2017, Ramp has just raised €47 million, only six months after closing its seed round. The London-based startup has created a payment infrastructure that makes crypto more useful, successful and open.
The fresh funding is led by Balderton Capital with participation from existing investors NFX, Galaxy Digital, Seedcamp, Firstminute Capital, as well as angel investors including Taavet Hinrikus (Wise) and Francesco Simonesci (TrueLayer).
Szymon Sypniewicz (CEO) and Przemek Kowalczyk (CTO, CPO) founded the company with the vision to take a responsible and long-term approach to bringing the benefits of crypto to the many, not the few. Through its non-custodial, full-stack payment infrastructure, Ramp opens up digital assets to more businesses and users and does so in a way that prioritises sustainable growth, trust and security.
Previously, cryptocurrencies have largely been the preserve of enthusiasts and have centred around crypto exchanges such as Coinbase and eToro which let customers exchange currency such as EUR, GBP, USD and so on, to cryptocurrencies and other crypto assets. However, these have by-and-large been built thinking of users who want ant to speculate on the prices of crypto assets and buy, hold and sell coins. This narrow remit fails to address the potential and power of crypto.
Szymon Sypniewicz, Ramp co-founder and CEO, said: “There is so much potential in unlocking cryptocurrency and digital assets beyond today’s narrow and restrictive use cases. We’re on a mission to provide instant access to cryptocurrencies through a provider they can trust.”
Ramp allows any brand or partner who wants to offer crypto-enabled services as part of their business model to do so easily and securely through the Ramp SDK. In a matter of hours, users can get up and running on the platform. At the same time, this allows such users to move between all Ramp-powered services without having to jump through multiple verification hoops.
In the same way, Stripe and PayPal revolutionised ecommerce and online payments by allowing any website, app or service to embed payment infrastructure into their existing systems, Ramp is having the same impact for crypto-assets and payment platforms.
The company is now a partner to more than 400 developers, including Mozilla, Browser, Dapper Labs (the company behind NBA Top Shot), and top crypto and DeFi (decentralized finance) apps like Aave, Argent, Trust Wallet, and Zerion. It is also the exclusive on-ramping partner for Sorare, the blockchain-based, global sports video game and Flow, the blockchain which specialises in NFT marketplaces and digital assets.
Following FCA approval in July, Ramp recently received regulatory approval from US FinCen – the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, which enables the company to operate legally in the US. In addition, Ramp (Poland) became the first on-ramping company to receive an open banking licence from The Polish Financial Supervision Authority (KNF) in 2020. Ramp will continue to work closely with the regulators in the markets it operates in so more companies can access the benefits of its transformative technology.
The new funding will allow the fintech startup to open new doors in the crypto world, such as facilitating crypto transactions for banks’ or other financial institutions’ end-users within their banking apps, or even unlocking new use cases of crypto. Ramp’s seamless experience aims to remove friction from the equation, so the possibilities are certainly there.
In addition, the funding will help the financial innovators continue their recruitment drive – they tripled the team in number over the past year, and want to keep momentum.
