The company was started in 2021 to solve payment challenges in Latin America, where about 70% of the population does not have a traditional bank account.
Ping users create a free account in U.S. dollars to receive bank transfers in either their local currency or crypto, including Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin. It also provides an invoicing system so that freelancers and contractors can send invoices to their employers. The company makes money from fees from its professional tier.
The possibility of opening a U.S. bank account or a crypto account and receiving a payment in U.S. dollars while also seamlessly swapping from one to another and making withdrawals in any country was certainly an interesting niche market that’s growing in the region.
That combination of payment from anywhere and the ability to operate in crypto seems to have caught on early for Ping. The platform launched four months ago, and within its first month of operations, the company generated over $1 million in payment volume.
The company is now also working off of $15 million in seed funding from a group of investors, including Y Combinator, Race Capital, BlockTower, Danhua Capital, Signum Capital and Goat Capital.
The funds will be deployed into team expansion, including hires for marketing and sales, and into product development in what will become a premium feature that will be a monthly subscription.