The centralized crypto exchange startup, Kriptomat, has just closed a €2.2M round led by LAUNCHub Ventures, a leading early-stage venture capital fund specializing in tech startups from Central and Southeast Europe. The company was started by a founding team in Slovenia and Serbia, registered in Estonia, and has teams in Serbia, Slovenia, Estonia, and the UK. This marks the beginning of a partnership and strategic investment agreement to grow in the cryptocurrency exchange market.
And the timing is good, too. Currently, approximately 106 million people use or invest in a cryptocurrency, The Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance reported in September 2020. The interest is growing, yet there is a huge untapped potential for people to be introduced to crypto wallets or purchased digital currencies.
“The crypto market is emerging and the addressable market is growing and there are many opportunities. We follow our vision that #EverybodyDeservesCrypto and build solutions to bridge the gap between traditional and crypto finance. We aim to become the 1st choice and go-to-place for new crypto users. We focus hard on our customers, understanding their expectations, and doing our best to earn and keep their trust in us,” shares Dejan Davidovic, co-founder and Chief Operating and Integrity Officer at Kriptomat, with The Recursive.
Education focus & centralized exchange are the winning attributes
The founders of Kriptomat believe they have at least two competitive advantages on their side: a friendly and educational onboarding experience, and a centralized approach.
Back in 2018, when Slovene founders Srdjan Mahmutovic and Dejan Davidovic started the company, they had an #EverybodyDeservesCrypto vision. The product was a platform where anyone can invest in, exchange, and store cryptocurrencies in their local language and with local support. Kriptomat has been optimizing its features to educate and engage new crypto users. They offer services in more than two dozen languages and guide customers from the first purchase to portfolio management.
“Kriptomat is a friendly, open, easy-to-use onramp into the crypto world – plus a deep bench of features to retain users and keep them engaged,” Lyuben Belov, LAUNCHub founding partner, confirms in the press release.
Moreover, Kriptomat is a centralized cryptocurrency exchange, which LAUNCHub Ventures sees as a strategic investment, despite the market’s recent uptake of late-generation decentralized exchanges.
“Centralized exchanges are key players for growing the market and serving those who don’t yet use cryptocurrencies. We see a future in which more and more people begin using cryptocurrencies, and in these cases, you want a centralized exchange that eases the transition. That’s where Kriptomat comes in,” Belov explains.
The two winning attributes go hand in hand. “Decentralized exchanges are exciting, but they lack the central resource library, support staff, and tutorial information that are needed by newcomers. Our goal is to make crypto easy enough for everyone, even people who lack degrees in computer science,” says Kriptomat general manager Srdjan Mahmutovic.
The partnership is set to help Kriptomat become more competitive in the crypto exchange market. LAUNCHub Ventures has experience in supporting the evolution of the cryptocurrency market starting in 2014 when they first invested in Bitcoin payment processor Cashila. This experience will “allow us to help them improve hiring, retention, and other critical non-crypto elements of their business,” adds Belov. Furthermore, the partnership will fuel Kriptomat’s growth plans and speed up the development and deployment of advanced competitive features.
