
EXCLUSIVE: Stripe-backed startup Tempo raises $500M led by Thrive Capital and Joshua Kushner’s Greenoaks
As excitement around stablecoins grows from Silicon Valley to Wall Street, one of the most prominent new cryptocurrency ventures has raised a massive fund to back its ambitious plans. Tempo, is a blockchain focused on payments sophisticated By the fintech giant tape Blockchain startup Paradigm has raised $500 million in new funding in a Series A round led by venture giant Greenoaks and Joshua Kushner’s Thrive Capital, according to five people familiar with the matter.
The round values Tempo at $5 billion, representing one of the highest value blockchain project rounds over the past few years. Sequoia, Ribbit Capital and Ron Conway’s SV Angel also participated, according to one of the people. The model and bar did not contribute capital to the round.
blockchain Tempo – which includes design partners such as OpenAI, ShopifyAnd Visa – designed primarily for stablecoins, represents a bet that dollar-backed cryptocurrencies will become the new infrastructure layer for global payments.
Greenoaks and Thrive leading the funding round is notable because the two public companies typically invest in key sectors like artificial intelligence and business-focused software, and their bet on Tempo is the latest evidence that cryptocurrencies have entered the mainstream. For Tempo, bringing together two top investment firms will help it challenge the leading companies in the native cryptocurrency space, starting with circle to pregnancyas well as disabling incumbents such as MasterCard.
Stripe, Paradigm, Greenoaks and SV Angel declined to comment. Thrive, Ribbit and Sequoia did not respond to a request for comment.
Enterprise blockchains
Tempo is just the latest crypto play from Stripe. In February, the payments company struck a deal to acquires Stablecoin startup Bridge for $1.1 billion. And in June, bar He said It intended to buy cryptocurrency wallet company Privy for an undisclosed sum.
Stripe has already begun rolling out a range of new stablecoin-related products, including Open versionwhich allows Stripe customers to launch their own stablecoins. and Bridge co-founder and CEO Zach Abrams He said On Tuesday that his Stripe-owned startup had applied for a credit charter with the national bank to comply with The law of geniusRecently, legislation was signed into law that sets regulatory guardrails for stablecoin issuers.
However, Tempo represents Stripe’s most ambitious project as it seeks to compete with established blockchains such as Ethereum and Solana That processes stablecoin transactions. Stripe has partnered with Paradigm to roll out the initiative, and Paradigm managing partner Matt Huang — who also serves on Stripe’s board of directors — is leading Tempo.
Its launch date is still unclear, and Tempo has not indicated whether it will release its own cryptocurrency token. The company previously Announce They will remain stablecoin neutral, meaning different tokens can be used to pay “gas” fees, or small payments required to process transactions.
Stripe’s Tempo isn’t the only blockchain planned from a big company. Since January, financial companies like online brokerage Robinhood and stablecoin giant Circle have done just that Released Plans To start their own blockchains.
Blockchains are basically networks of servers that process crypto transactions. Upcoming chains from the likes of Stripe and Robinhood represent attempts to own every layer of the cryptocurrency technology stack, from the software that supports stablecoin transfers to the underlying servers that process them.
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