For the past year and a half, a Silicon Valley startup has quietly convinced some of the biggest names in venture capital to back its effort to turn the technology behind bitcoin into a mass-marketed phenomenon.
Now, that company, which bears the name 21 Inc., is emerging from stealth to announce it has raised $116 million in venture funding, the most ever by a startup in the digital-currency sector, based on data from bitcoin news service Coindesk.
What it’s not yet publicizing is the precise nature of its operations, Chief Executive and co-founder Matthew Pauker will only say there will be “several interesting developments over the next weeks and months” about software and hardware products designed “to drive mainstream adoption of bitcoin.”
While I don’t normally post Bitcoin-related news, it appears this will be a very well-funded group in the blockchain technology space.
I don’t think we should deliberately not talk about bitcoin and see it as a rival. I believe both in bitcoin and in nubits and it’s refreshing to have some general crypto related talks in this nubits oriented forum sometimes. This announcement is definitely promising. Perhaps it’s the reason why BTC has nearly conquered 300$ prices again?
It’s definitely nice to see investment being made into the blockchain tech sector, since the price of NSR will increase with BTC in the short-term. For any San Francisco Nu users reading this, 21 Inc. is apparently hiring for quite a few positions as well: https://21.co/#jobs
That much money to only fuel bitcoin would be a waste. I feel it s fueling the entire crypto scene, including nubits.
I was surprised to learn that shapeshift had been founded by eric voorhes, and then backed by roger ver and larry siebert. The last names have been so far extremely bitcoin centric so far. I feel a shift in consciousness due to pure capitalism.
At the occasion the company source claimed that the funds will be used for broadening the scope of Bitcoin technology. 21 Inc, a Bitcoin mining pool, is working on specially designed chips that will drive new equipment specifically aimed at doing this more efficiently. The company has yet to publicly reveal the exact nature of its operations though.