Digital Currency Group acquires leading cryptocurrency exchange, Luno

SEP 09, 2020

BY BALDERTON

DCG will help fuel Luno’s global growth in Africa, Asia, Europe, and beyond. Luno will continue to operate as an independent, wholly-owned subsidiary of DCG.

Digital Currency Group (DCG), a global enterprise that builds, buys, and invests in blockchain companies, today announced the acquisition of Balderton portfolio company, Luno. 

Balderton first invested in Luno in September 2017. 

Led by co-founder and CEO Marcus Swanepoel, Luno has become a digital asset powerhouse in many emerging and frontier markets, providing digital asset education, knowledge, and investment tools for individuals in Africa, Asia, and Europe.

The past seven years have been an incredibly exciting journey for Luno – so far helping millions of our customers get access to crypto for the first time

Luno co-founder and CEO Marcus Swanepoel

Marcus Swanepoel , co-founder and CEO, Luno speaks to Hiroki Takeuchi, co-founder and CEO, GoCardless and Bram de Zwart, co-founder and CEO, 3D Hubs at the Balderton CEO Collective Summit in 2018.

Luno has helped broaden the global crypto investment community and 2020 has been a record year so far in growth in its customer base. 

The company is committed to upgrading the world to a better financial system, believing that legacy systems were built for a non-digital age, ignoring the needs of modern individuals and adding unnecessary inefficiencies and gatekeepers. The world now has access to new technologies like Bitcoin and Ethereum that will fundamentally change how the world views and uses money. 

Having the full backing of DCG just as we’re experiencing such a pivotal moment of growth in the industry is not just an exciting and important milestone for Luno, but more importantly, it will significantly accelerate our ability to reach our goal to help upgrade 1 billion people to a better financial system by 2030.

Luno co-founder and CEO Marcus Swanepoel

The Luno leadership team will remain entirely intact and Swanepoel will lead acquisition efforts in his role as CEO.

The company will maintain key regional offices in Kuala Lumpur, Lagos, Jakarta, and Johannesburg, and will continue to focus on the existing geographies where it operates across Europe, Africa, and Asia.

The Luno team has also developed an aggressive road map for future growth and will ultimately compete with financial services firms all over the world.

Luno is actively hiring for positions all over the world. See their open positions here. 

You can also read the blog post on the acquisition from Luno CEO, Marcus Swanepoel, here. 

Read Colin Hanna's original blog post on our investment in Luno

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