Poland’s Ramp Raises $70M Series B Despite Crypto Crash

Cryptocurrency payments startup Ramp, with offices in Poland and London, has raised $70 million in new investment, despite a difficult fundraising environment and turmoil in the crypto industry.

Their Series B, led by UAE’s Mubadala Capital and France’s Korelya Capital, comes less than a year after inception raised a Series A of $53 million. It is one of the largest funding rounds in the history of the Polish startup ecosystem.

What does Ramp do?

Ramp enables clients such as crypto wallets, exchanges, NFT marketplaces and gaming companies to embed crypto payment infrastructure into their existing systems so that users can purchase crypto assets without having to jump to other apps.

It is integrated with the world’s major payment methods, including debit and credit cards, bank transfers, Apple Pay and Google Pay, and is available to users in more than 150 countries.

How is the market?

Bearish, to say the least. By November 2021, the global crypto market had grown to nearly $3 billion – only to lose two-thirds of its value by mid-2022, as inflation and a bleak economic outlook deterred investors. This has resulted in widespread layoffs at European companies such as Blockchain.com and Bitpanda, the collapse of several cryptocurrencies such as TerraUSD and yesterday’s acquisition of the second largest crypto exchange, FTX.

But Ramp seems to be immune to these trends. During 2022, it has generated an increase of almost 240% in transaction volumes compared to the same period last year. The total number of unique users has increased by over 600%.

The startup is also hiring: it has sevenfold the number of employees in the past year, to more than 200 today.

“Although we have grown rapidly, we have been cautious and laser-focused on developing our product to adapt to our partners’ business requirements, while keeping our finger on the pulse of the market’s long-term trends,” says Szymon Sypniewicz, Ramp’s co-founder and CEO .

Who invests?

• Mubadala Capital, co-lead investor, an Emirati VC
• The capital of Koreaco-lead investor, a French VC
• Balderton capitalan existing investor, UK VC
• Cogito capital, a Polish VC

What’s next for Ramp?

Sypniewicz says that with his Series B he wants to make the Ramp product more accessible to more people. “This means entering local markets and enabling local payment methods,” he says.

“Local payment methods reduce friction and cost for lower-income regions, while being more intuitive and accessible to more people in the world. This is especially true in Latin America and Asia, both regions that have seen explosive crypto adoption and which we consider our next strategic goals.”

The company will also continue to hire and invest further in its product line.

Sifted’s take

Ramp’s resilience to the current economic downturn shows that it plays an important role in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. It is very often compared to Stripe, which has produced a market-leading similar tool for the e-commerce space; Stripe is now valued at around $74 billion.

Sypniewicz also adds that the company wants to take advantage of the trend of mainstream companies moving into Web3. Web3 refers to a new generation of blockchain-powered businesses that embrace decentralization and democratize ownership – unlike centralized platforms like Facebook and YouTube.

“It’s a huge opportunity and it’s just one example of the huge potential we see ahead for the industry beyond the current downturn,” he says.

“If you’ve been in crypto as long as we have, you’ll realize that a bear market is a building market, and we’re fully committed to our vision – making Web3 a reality for everyone. We’re in it for the long haul ”.

Zosia Wanat is Sifted’s Central and Eastern European reporter, based in Warsaw. She tweets from @zosiawanat