The largest bitcoin kiosk chain in the world is scaling up: Coinme now has more than 2,000 locations across 23 states and is adding kiosks in Houston, Boston, Chicago, and Los Angeles, a partner has announced.
The company—and the idea of bitcoin kiosks—is picking up momentum: Coinme’s transaction volume rose by 92 percent in the first quarter of 2019, the company says. It processed more than twice as many transactions in the first quarter of 2019 as in the same period last year.
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Coinme offers customers the ability to put cash into physical kiosks in return for bitcoin, which gets deposited in their wallets. It has recently launched in retail chains like Albertsons and Safeway. Its rapid up-scaling has been achieved mainly by partnering with Coinstar, a company that operates more than 20,000 fiat currency coin-counting kiosks in nine countries.
Coinme will hope to benefit from Coinstar's expertise in countries like the UK, Canada, Germany and France.
Coinstar’s international presence gives Coinme a clear path to continued expansion, as it will hope to benefit from the established corporate relationships and expertise of its larger partner in countries like the UK, Canada, Germany, and France.
It also announced the appointment of two new executives with experience at the top of tech. Alex Ketter, who used to be a compliance manager at Google, will be Coinme’s new chief of compliance. Jon Maron, a former marketing VP at HTC, will take care of their marketing.
The company is backed by venture capitalists, whose most recent investment totaled $2.5 million, according to financial data provider PitchBook. The investment has only been “early stage” so far. The next round will presumably add a few zeros.