During the last couple of months, numerous blockchain-based companies have sprouted up, in order to help this new industry develop. One of these is the London-based bitcoin blockchain surveillance and intelligence startup known by the name of Elliptic.
According to recent reports, and to a press release submitted by the company, it seems like Elliptic has managed to secure a total of $5 million in a Series A funding round, which has been led by the Paladin Capital Group. It’s also worth pointing out that Elliptic has received support from a few more groups, including the Digital Currency Group, Octopus Ventures, Santander InnoVentures and KRW Schindler.
In the past, Elliptic has secured a couple of other funding rounds, but this one will surely enable the company to become the leading player in the bitcoin intelligence, compliance and fraud detection market.
For those who are not yet aware, Elliptic is an English company, which was initially meant to be a bitcoin cold storage solution. However, as time passed, the management of the company decided to move to another market. At this moment in time, Elliptic offers numerous services, one of its main features being the use of blockchain intelligence tools, machine learning and graph analysis to review the blockchain, and detect and illicit activity going on it. Based on this, the software solution also makes use of artificial intelligence (AI) to scan the network and detect any anomalies. Once suspicious activity is found, the system proceeds to further analyse it, and then trace it to its original source.
At this moment in time, it has been reported that Elliptic has scanned through over $2 billion in bitcoin, as their services are employed by a large number of EU and US-based bitcoin exchanges, and other blockchain-based companies.
Additionally, the platform has also been proven to be of great use to law enforcement agencies, as it can easily track the source of unidentified currency, being processed on the blockchain. To put things better into perspective, in a recent interview, the CEO and co-founder of Elliptic, Dr James Smith stated that: “For them (law enforcement agencies), it's a product that helps them trace money through the networks and find their way to regulated entities from whom they can go and get personally identifiable information. For example, you want to trace some money and want to figure out which exchange it ended up on so you can go to that exchange and say, 'Hey, which customer bought this? I think we need to arrest him.”
When asked about how he plans to spend the $5 million investment, he stated that the funds will be spend on exploring new product areas, but also on hiring more experts, needed to take the company to the next level.
Based on everything that has been outlined so far, what do you personally think about Elliptic’s Series A funding round and the success they have? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section below.