IDG leads $60m round for US fintech start-up's China push
IDG Capital Partners has led a $60 million financing round for Circle, a US-based financial technology start-up seeking to build a blockchain-supported peer-to-peer payments system business in China.
Other investors included US venture firms Breyer Capital and General Catalyst Partners as well as a syndicate of strategic partners in China, including Baidu, CICC ALPHA, China Everbright, Wanxiang and CreditEase. Sam Palmisano, former chairman and CEO of IBM, as well as Glenn Hutchins, co-founder of SilverLake also participated in the round.
"Working together with Breyer Capital, IDG is very bold on Circle's vision of blockchain and social payment," Hugo Shong, founding general partner of IDG said in a statement. "Just like the success of Alipay and WeChat Pay here in China, we have full confidence in the Circle team building global products which will be enjoyed by hundreds of millions of people daily."
Circle offers software that facilitates international payments and currency exchanges by incorporating established social media applications with the online data transfer security protocols of blockchain technology. This service aims to leverage China's large scaling potential and accelerating proliferation of novel payment systems through a separate, recently established company based in Beijing. It is already in use in the US and the UK, and is planned to be rolled out across Europe starting next month.
IDG co-led a $50 million round for the company last year with Goldman Sachs. This investment also included participation from Breyer and General Catalyst as well as Accel Partners, Oak Investment Partners, Fenway Summer, Digital Currency Group and Pantera Capital.
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