Bitpanda Founder Christian Trummer, Paul Klanschek, Eric Demuth
News Savings And Investment
Bitpanda valued at $4.1bn after $263m round
Austria’s newly minted unicorn has tripled its valuation just four months after raising capital from investors to expand its digital wealth platform.
The digital wealth and crypto spaces are on fire in 2021, spurred by a surge in demand for digital investment platforms and widening acceptance of the cryptocurrency story.
In Europe, one of the biggest beneficiaries has been Austria’s only fintech unicorn Bitpanda which says it has acquired 1.2 million users in the first half of the year and is now valued at $4.1bn after closing a $263m Series C round led by Valar Ventures.
The Series C funding round, which also saw LeadBlock Partners, Jump Capital (both existing investors) as well as Alan Howard and REDO Ventures participate. It comes just four months after Bitpanda raised cash in March 2021 at a $1.2bn valuation.
Bitpanda will use the new funds, it says, to strengthen its team and double down on technology, international expansion and growth.
Founded in Austria in 2014 by Eric Demuth, Paul Klanschek and Christian Trummer, (pictured) Bitpanda started as a crypto-trading company but has expanded to offer a wider range of investment products such as Exchange Traded Funds (ETFs) and commission-free fractional stocks alongside cryptocurrencies or precious metals.
The Vienna based company now boasts 3 million users and is on track to achieve 6x customer growth year over year. Revenues meanwhile are seat to increase sevenfold in 2021 compared with 2020.
In June, it tapped into the potential of the B2B market with Bitpanda While Label, opening its infrastructure to fintechs or banks that want to offer trading to their clients.
The firm has more than 500 people working across its Vienna HQ as well as physical tech hubs and offices in eight cities across Europe, including Vienna, Barcelona, Berlin, Krakow, London, Madrid, Milan, and Paris.
Bitpanda has also been on a hiring spree in recent months with four key hires plucked from the world of fintech: Lindsay Ross, ex-Adyen and MessageBird, as Chief HR Officer; Irina Scarlat, ex-Revolut and Uber, as Chief Growth Officer; João Luís, ex-Farfetch, as VP of Engineering; and Michael Keskerides, ex-N26, as VP Product.
Eric Demuth, Co-Founder & CEO of Bipanda, said: “We started Bitpanda in 2014 with a clear vision: to bring investing closer to everyone, everywhere. We wouldn’t be here today without the efforts of our talented team members who are constantly “rolling up their sleeves” to make things happen.”
