Stripe has raised $245 million in funding; better positioning the company to expand to new markets globally and attract bigger customers.
US payments start-up, Stripe stated that it has raised $245 million in a new round of funding, valuing the company at $20 billion. The latest funding round was led by billionaire investor Chase Coleman’s hedge fund Tiger Global Management, along with DST Global and Sequoia.
Stripe, which was valued at about $9 billion in late 2016, reported being added Alphabet Inc.’s Google, Uber Technologies Inc, and Spotify Technology SA as its customers. The list of customers shows the way Stripe is targeting a new market of larger business players.
Brothers John and Patrick Collison founded and launched Stripe in 2011. John Collison, Co-Founder, Stripe, stated, “We think this investment will be helpful as we continue to march upmarket and serve these larger companies.”
The company provides technology that allows businesses of every size, from new start-ups to public companies to use Stripe for accepting payments and managing businesses online. It charges a fee for each payment activity processed through its platform. Stripe combines a payments platform with applications that put revenue data at the heart of business operations. Its products have expanded to include credit cards, subscription-based billing and debit cards.
After launching, Stripe quickly became the payments service of choice for other Silicon Valley start-ups, offering a quick and relatively simple way to collect payments from customers without the hassle of traditional banking procedures.
Stripe’s steps towards being global
Stripe, headquartered in San Francisco, has its offices in Dublin, London, Paris, Singapore, and Tokyo. In July 2018, the Stripe collaborated with digital payment firms Alipay and WeChat Pay to enable merchants using its platform globally to accept payments from their Chinese consumers.
As the world’s fastest-blooming developer platform, Stripe provides businesses the tools and technology to build better. It tends to work with financial institutions, regulators, payment networks, banks, and consumer wallets so businesses that run on Stripe do not have to.
Stripe’s forthcoming strategy
After the huge funding, Stripe is looking forward to using the funds to improve its key areas, including, rapidly expanding its international reach and growing its global payments and treasury network. The company hopes to tap the growing use of e-commerce, mainly in Southeast Asia and India. According to Stripe, about 500 million people are expected to become online customers in the next three years. Stripe also said it would open a new engineering hub in Singapore soon.
