Transparent Raises $14 Million in Funding for a Decentralised Payment Settlement Network

Transparent Raises $14 Million in Funding for a Decentralised Payment Settlement Network

By Benson Toti - min read
Updated 21 March 2023

Transparent Systems has raised a substantial amount of funding, with some big names getting involved. This means that they now have a solid financial footing to progress with their ideas. So what are their plans for a decentralised payment settlement network about?

A new decentralised payment settlement network is taking shape
Image courtesy of Pxhere

Details of the Funding

$14 million was raised in this funding round. Some of the names involved in this include Pantera Capital and Square.

Alex Fowler is the CEO of Transparent Systems. He pointed out that the money will go towards accelerating the development of their product. They will also be able to expand their team and bring in enterprise software engineers. There are currently 25 people working on it.

Pantera Capital led the Series A funding round. Square, which was set up by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, was also heavily involved. Other heavyweights in the picture include Digital Currency Group, CMT Digital and FuturePerfect Ventures.

In this way, their total funding to date has now reached $22 million. This is due to the fact that they had already raised $8 million in July 20918, as seed funding.

What Is Their Product?

Transparent is based in Seattle and was founded in 2018 by the late Paul Allen. Their plan is to introduce a real-time, decentralised payment settlement network. This isn’t a completely new idea. It has been tried in South Africa and Ripple has been so successful that an IPO is being planned.

Their overall goal is to transform the process for cash settlement, making it faster and cheaper. Alex Fowler confirmed that they are “building a new, cryptographically secure, real-time settlement solution”.

This will remove the transaction costs and the “friction associated with traditional payment rails”. Their solution will remove the single points of control that they believe restrict transactions in the traditional financial world.

The CEO of Transparent Systems was guarded on the exact details. For instance, he wouldn’t confirm if they will be building their own blockchain. Instead, Fowler confirmed that more details will be released in the coming months

What Does the Future Hold?

The Transparent decentralised payment settlement network is at the beta stage. Some major names from the financial industry in the US are said to be involved in this. They will be focussing initially on B2B payments and treasury management.

It is hoped that it will be released for commercial use later in 2020. What isn’t yet clear is whether it will have an effect on Ripple, which offers a decentralised payment settlement network too. JPMorgan has also launched the JPCoin to allow money to be sent over the blockchain instantly.