Crypto payment services provider BCB Group has acquired software engineering venture studio LAB577 for an undisclosed amount.
Both fintech firms are based in London. BCB Group offers business accounts and trading services for the digital asset economy, while LAB577 sees itself at the “nexus” of financial services and emerging technology.
BCB Group Founder and CEO Oliver von Landsberg-Sadie comments: “As one of LAB577’s first clients, we’ve always been in awe of their ability to deliver innovative blockchain tech in a way that plays well in both TradFi and DeFi.”
Both companies are well known to each other, having worked together for four years as they seek to prosper in the competitive digital assets sector.
BCB Group provides a suite of payment processing, cryptocurrency trading and custody services via an API-enabled platform. It also offers BLINC, an instant settlements network and real-time payment networks for transactions across fiat and digital currencies.
LAB577 offers a financial product, called DASL (Digital Asset Shared Ledger) – and which must be special as it has its own LinkedIn page.
Richard Crook, Founder of LAB577, who now becomes the COO of BCB Group, explains: “DASL becoming part of BLINC will extend participants’ ability to settle instantly in any currency or digital asset, with no limits.”
The LAB577 team will be incorporated into BCB Group, with Farzad ‘Fuzz’ Pezeshkpour becoming the CTO of BCB Group. LAB577 was founded in 2018 and has 10 employees listed on LinkedIn.
BCB Group has started the year in energetic fashion.
As eWeek UK reported last month, it closed a $60 million (£44.6 million) Series A funding round.
The fintech company said the funding round will enable it to provide payments and market infrastructure across more (undisclosed) regions, and acquire stakes in infrastructure partners.
BCB Group was founded in 2017 and has offices in Zürich and Neuchâtel in Switzerland; and in Johannesburg. Its clients include Bitstamp, Kraken, Gemini, Galaxy, BitPay and Circle.
