Remote Work Life Podcast
At Remote Work Life, we spotlight successful location-independent entrepreneurs and established remote work professionals. Our interviews highlight their journeys and growth strategies, and their inspiring stories offer ideas for your entrepreneurial and professional ventures and reveal insights on thriving while working remotely.
Remote Work Life Podcast
RWL242 Remote, Resilient, Revolutionary: MoonPay's Path to $3.4 Billion
Ever wondered what it takes to build a multi-billion dollar company in the middle of a market crash? MoonPay founders Ivan Soter-Wright and Victor Faramund saw opportunity where others saw disaster, creating a crypto infrastructure business now valued at $3.4 billion.
Founded in 2019 when Bitcoin had plunged 80%, MoonPay tackled a straightforward problem: making cryptocurrency purchases as simple as using a credit card. The founders' complementary skills proved essential to their success—Ivan bringing visionary fintech experience while Victor contributed technical depth from his time at Apple. Their balanced partnership exemplifies how different perspectives create stronger businesses, especially in volatile industries.
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Ivan Soter-Wright and Victor Faramund are the founders behind Moonpay, a remote-friendly crypto infrastructure company that's grown from a simple idea to a business valued at over $3.4 billion. Their story is a clear example of how location-independent businesses can scale fast in the digital economy, even when operating in one of the most volatile industries out there. The starting point for MoonPay was a single, straightforward question what if buying cryptocurrency was as easy as using a credit card? In 2019, at a time when crypto markets had just taken a massive hit Bitcoin was down nearly 80% Ivan and Victor believed that crypto's long-term potential was far from over. Instead of retreating like many others, at that moment, they saw an opportunity sitting right in front of them. The two founders brought very different but complementary skills to the table.
Speaker 1:Ivan, who became CEO, came from a background in fintech and entrepreneurship. Before Moonpay, he'd built Saveable, a smart money app that helped people across Europe automate investments and manage their spending. That company was eventually acquired, and from there, ivan also went on to start a venture capital fund focused on crypto and emerging financial technology. Venture capital fund focused on crypto and emerging financial technology. His academic background was a mix of economics and philosophy, studied on both sides of the Atlantic at George Washington University and later at Oxford. Victor, on the other hand, came with deep technical expertise. He worked as a software engineer at Apple and played a major role in the early development of a startup called Skello, an online scheduling software. He brought extensive full-stack engineering experience paired with a strong academic foundation in mathematics and computer science from top European institutions. Their personalities balanced each other out. Ivan has often been described as the big picture visionary, always looking at what's possible, while Victor brought a more grounded, pragmatic approach, keeping their engineering decisions tied to reality. That mix of idealism and realism became one of Moonpay's strengths, especially as they navigated the uncertain world of crypto.
Speaker 1:They started small, with just five people making up the original team. Their minimum viable product went live first in Tokyo, which was a very deliberate early market test. From there they expanded globally. The first product focused entirely on solving what's known as the on-ramp problem helping everyday users convert traditional fiat currencies into crypto quickly and securely. From day one, moonpay was adapted to run as a remote business and, while they officially list Miami as their headquarters, most of the team works on a distributed basis. The company operates across multiple time zones, serving customers in more than 160 countries. That remote model allowed them to hire globally, without the restrictions of office locations or regional talent pools. It also meant they could develop, iterate and support customers around the clock, keeping the business moving even while some parts of the team were asleep. The nature of their business building infrastructure for a decentralized financial system was perfectly aligned with building a decentralized organization. Their business model is simple at its core, but highly scalable.
Speaker 1:Moonpay positions itself as the PayPal for crypto, offering the payment infrastructure that bridges traditional finance with cryptocurrency. Payment infrastructure that bridges traditional finance with cryptocurrency. Their platform serves two main groups individual consumers and business clients. For individuals, moonpay offers an incredibly simple interface that allows users to purchase crypto with familiar payment methods Credit cards, debit cards, apple Pay, google Pay, paypal, even local bank transfers. What's important here is that Moonpay operates as a non-custodial platform, meaning they don't hold the customer's funds. The user retains control over their assets, which aligns with the core values that underpin much of the crypto ecosystem. For businesses, moonpay offers embeddable infrastructure that allows any app or website to integrate crypto payments seamlessly. A few lines of code is all it takes for other companies to embed MoonPay's solution directly into their own platforms. This model removes the headache of compliance, fraud protection and payment processing from the partners who adopt their solution. This dual business-to-consumer and business-to-business model helped Moonpay expand extremely quickly. By 2023, they were serving over 30 million users across more than 300 business platforms, with over $2 billion in transactions processed in their first two years alone. Today, they support over 80 different crypto assets and they continue to expand that offering.
Speaker 1:Naturally, building a crypto company comes with regulatory challenges. Compliance with global anti-money laundering regulations is complex and constantly shifting is complex and constantly shifting. Moonpay made regulatory compliance a priority early on. That upfront investment in security and compliance helped them build trust with both users and institutional partners, trust that's especially critical in the crypto space, where security breaches and regulatory uncertainty have derailed many competitors. The fact that Moonpay launched right after a major crypto crash might seem like poor timing, but in some ways, it was exactly the opposite. Building infrastructure during a market downturn allowed them to grow quietly, focus on their product and be well positioned when crypto enthusiasm picked up. The growth really took off after their Series A funding round in late 2021.
Speaker 1:Moonpay raised $555 million in one of the largest Series A rounds ever for a crypto startup. That round was led by major investors like Tiger Global and KOTU Management, valuing the company at $3.4 billion. They added another $87 million shortly after in a Series A extension. The funding allowed Moonpay to scale quickly. The team grew from around 130 employees to over 300. At the time of this recording, they sit somewhere between 200 and 500 employees globally, still operating primarily as a remote organization.
Speaker 1:With the new capital, they began expanding their product suite beyond simple crypto on-ramps. They moved deeper into Web3 infrastructure, including NFT payments and additional enterprise solutions. They also pursued strategic acquisitions, including discussions to acquire HelioPay, a crypto e-commerce platform, for roughly $150 million. Partnerships have also played a big role in MoonPay's expansion. They've worked with major brands like Fox, universal Pictures and even Snoop Dogg's Death Row Records to build NFT platforms, helping bring crypto and NFTs into mainstream media. These partnerships allowed MoonPay to move beyond the core crypto native audience and into wider consumer markets. Today, their user base includes more than 30 million people across 160 countries, which is remarkable when you consider they started with just five people only a few years ago.
Speaker 1:Ivan and Victor's story stands out for a few reasons. First, their partnership shows the power of complementary skill sets. Having a visionary founder balanced by a technically grounded co-founder creates strong decision-making dynamics. Second, their remote first model wasn't an afterthought or a pandemic pivot. It was intentional and it allowed them to recruit globally, scale rapidly and operate efficiently without being tied to any single geography. This is something I strongly believe more founders can take advantage of today.
Speaker 1:Third, they solved a real problem. Buying crypto used to be complicated. Moonpay simplified the process for both consumers and businesses, removing friction that kept many potential users on the sidelines. Fourth, they didn't let market timing scare them off. Launching during a downturn gave them breathing room to build and by the time crypto interest returned, they were already positioned and ready to capture and ride that wave. And finally, they built multiple revenue streams early, both B2C and B2B, which allowed them to scale faster and build resilience into the business model. That's it for today's episode. Please consider subscribing to the show, leaving a review, or share it with someone. Building their own location independent venture.
