Chainalysis: Announcing Our Series B
We have come a long way since we announced our $16M Series A in April 2018. We:
- Continued to grow our data advantage. We now support 85% of the top twenty coins by trading volume.
- Deployed Chainalysis KYT (Know Your Transaction), our real-time anti-money laundering and compliance solution for cryptocurrencies, and now have over 100 financial institutions and cryptocurrency exchanges signed up to use it.
- Expanded our coverage beyond Bitcoin to include Ether, Litecoin, Bitcoin Cash, and stablecoins to better analyze the funds involved in money laundering schemes, track contributions to ICO scams, and identify other forms of illicit activity in both Chainalysis Reactor, our investigations solution, and Chainalysis KYT (Know Your Transaction), our compliance solution.
- Broadened our support of global investigations with Chainalysis Reactor and have now tracked billions of dollars of stolen funds.
This is just the beginning. Illicit activity will continue to increase in absolute terms as the industry grows and as institutions prepare to transact in cryptocurrency. We will use our new funding to grow our global footprint, double down on our data, invest even more in new cryptocurrencies and multi-currency support, and continue to improve our compliance and investigation software. There is significant work to do in preparation for regulatory clarity and the institutionalization and mainstream adoption of cryptocurrency.
Growing our global footprint
Although we've had feet on the ground in London for a while, we are excited to officially open an office there. As our second European office following Copenhagen, London will act as our hub for European business as well as anchoring our research. We will look to double our headcount there, tapping into London's deep talent pool. The city is optimal for its proximity to top universities that increasingly recognize cryptocurrency as a technology poised to reshape the way people exchange value across the world. The office will position us to work with the major financial institutions and cryptocurrency businesses based in that market, as well as European governments. It's also convenient that our newest board member, Accel's Philippe Botteri, is based in London!
Additionally, we expect to continue to grow our business in APAC. In particular, cryptocurrency businesses founded in the region are quickly adopting anti-money laundering (AML) technology like ours in order to compete in the global arena and engage with users in the U.S. and Europe, and we expect this trend to continue. Cryptocurrency is borderless by design, and our technology can be used seamlessly across the world, regardless of local or international regulations.
Doubling down on data
Our core objective is to organize the world's blockchain data and make it accessible and useful to governments, financial institutions, and cryptocurrency businesses. We are doubling down on our investment in our people and technology that builds our understanding of how and why people use cryptocurrencies. Specifically, we are building a team that is focused on attributing more services associated with criminal activity, including darknet markets, scams, ransomware, terrorist financing, and sanctions evasion.
Our investigations and compliance software are only as good as our underlying historical data. It's like Netflix building a catalogue: the new shows are great, but they also need the classics for a complete collection. Chainalysis is the only company that has been systematically collecting information that links real world entities to blockchain transactions since 2014.
We analyze new cryptocurrencies far in advance of launching them in our products. This year, we'll prepare for coins that we expect to launch in 2020. We maintain rigorous standards on our level of data coverage before we make new coins available in our products. This ensures fast investigations and accurate risk scores for our customers.
Investing even more in new cryptocurrencies and multi-currency support
We know it's critical for our customers that we cover the most widely used cryptocurrencies. Cryptocurrency businesses need to monitor the breadth of coins and tokens they support, and investigators need to trace across multiple blockchains. That's why we overhauled our infrastructure and completely rethought how to best support multiple cryptocurrencies in our products. Now we're prioritizing the cryptocurrencies that have significant market share or are particularly meaningful to our customers. Last month we announced our expansion into stablecoins, with Paxos and TrustToken as our launch partners for Chainalysis KYT for Stablecoins. Stay tuned for additional coins and tokens rolling out over the next several months.
Continually improving our compliance and investigation software to create the fair marketplace for the responsible adoption of cryptocurrencies
We believe cryptocurrencies' open ledgers can actually set the standard for "regtech" once overarching regulation is in place. By harnessing technology like ours, regulators, compliance departments, consultancies, and Financial Intelligence Units (FIUs) can gain unprecedented insight into how and why people move money across the world. In addition to this transparency, blockchain compliance technology can screen transactions in real time. This visibility and velocity means cryptocurrency can, in many circumstances, help identify underlying risks better than in traditional financial markets.
In other words, we're ready to help governments, financial institutions, and cryptocurrency businesses enforce and comply with regulations across jurisdictions. That said, we are always improving Chainalysis Reactor and Chainalysis KYT to help our customers navigate a world in which cryptocurrency is more clearly regulated and therefore more mainstream. We're focused on making our powerful software easier to use and releasing advanced features for even more insight and control.
Blockchains' potential to bring positive change is broad, ranging from streamlining remittances to serving the underbanked in the U.S. and abroad. But there is a long road ahead before cryptocurrency fulfills this potential. Building trust— among governments, financial institutions, cryptocurrency businesses, and consumers— is the most vital step in cryptocurrency's transformation into an invaluable technology that protects our safety and enables greater prosperity. We believe this radical transformation is best done gradually, and we're looking forward to this exciting next phase of our company's— and our industry's— growth.
We're growing! Check out our 25+ open roles here.
Healthcare Tech Nonprofit Doing Sales?
I am a passionate person on many topics, but particularly on those that have such a profound impact on those less fortunate. So the thought of joining a nonprofit always carried appeal. However it wasn't until a really well respected Founder in the Bay Area (especially in the sales community) brought an opportunity my way to lead sales at CareMessage. After speaking with the CareMessage CEO, Vineet Singal, the aforementioned Founder and then reading up on Dan Pallotta's view on how nonprofits SHOULD operate, it became clear this would be a difficult opportunity to pass up. Having been here now for nearly 18 months, I'm glad I didn't.
As someone who genuinely loves helping people uncover and pursue their own passions, I hear so often from friends, family, peers, and even strangers about how difficult it can be to find work they can draw inspiration from and genuinely love to do everyday. In fact, Having gone through the same struggle, I was fortunate to have met people like Konrad Waliszewki, Founder and CEO of Tripscout, Blake Garrett, CEO of Aceable, Khalid Halim, Founder and Professional Coach at Reboot.io and my high school mentor and current Headmaster of Saint John's School, Alex Zequeira. These people made hard decisions to leave comfortable positions to pursue work that would make them feel more challenged, happy and fulfilled. While very different kinds of work, the common thread is each has made hard decisions and left comfortable positions to pursue such work.
I mention each of them to make the point that there are lots of important problems to work on out there. The only thing that matters is that you can say to yourself and others it's what you love to do. We work so many hours and it impacts so many aspects of our lives. We owe ourselves at least that effort. CareMessage just happens to represent a glaring example of a place where you can trust the work will be meaningful, especially considering there is arguably no more important topic in America today than healthcare. It is truly a matter of life or death for millions of Americans, including for many of us, and our loved ones. CareMessage is helping improvements in healthcare quality. From California to Massachusetts and so many states in between, the shift towards value based care and payments is underway. Providers are desperate for technology like CareMessage to keep their patients engaged and provide better care in more cost effective and measurable ways.
No one gets into sales to be at a company with flat growth, no matter how meaningful the mission. Dan's work attempts to address the root of that issue for nonprofits, and struck a chord for me as I made my own transition. He is paving a new path for nonprofits to follow, one that makes clear the importance of having a scalable and sustainable model to drive growth. One that makes it clear just how important it is to invest in growth. We are measured not just by the purity of our mission but by the scale at which we can have that mission impact patients lives. 2 million patients (our current reach) is noble but we have our sights on 100 million. To do that, we need to invest in building the best product, marketing and sales teams, just as any other tech company would do in order to achieve their goals.
The Sales and Customer Success teams at CareMessage
This is the fourth tech startup where I've been able to help lead sales. The first was a really successful acquisition while the second two exceeded the most significant revenue milestone that show they're here to stay. All, including CareMessage, had experienced roughly the same revenue growth at the point at which I joined. Having seen this several times before I can say with confidence CareMessage has all the elements to become a huge success and I think represents as good an opportunity as you will find in search of meaningful work, where your paycheck won't suffer. Here are a few reasons that explain what that could mean for you:
- You wake up every morning with a clear purpose and conviction that your work can and will change the world for the better. Not to mention on a topic that has never received as much attention as it is now.
- Strong financial backing having raised greater than $20M since inception from partners like Google.org who have said "We chose [CareMessage] because you and your team have continued to show a strong ability to execute, to build and grow a product that creates real social impact in the communities you serve, and to value the data and evaluation that makes it easy for us to track that impact."
- Healthcare is in desperate need of better technology but the options are limited. The combination of lack of competition and dire need means those focused on the right problems, like CareMessage, should reap the rewards.
- Work on large, interesting opportunities that will challenge you and push you to get better. You'll have leadership committed to ensuring you are constantly learning and taking on work you are passionate about and will help you grow.
- Work for a company that cares about your performance, not whether you're showing your face for a certain number of hours everyday.
- Over 200 customers and many household names in healthcare with whom CareMessage has already proven this works.
Learn more about me here and what you can expect based on my style and approach. I hope I can help you find what you're looking for here at CareMessage but happy to make the connection either way. I can be reached at mhaylon[at]caremessage.org. You can apply to any open positions here. Otherwise, I look forward to hearing from you.
From The Co-Founder Of Calm: "It's 2019 - Why Aren't There Any Mental Health Unicorns?"
We're looking to double our team this year from 50 to 100 people so we'd love to hear from you if you're interested in our mission to improve the health and happiness of the world.
There are lots of fast-growing sectors in tech but few as important, positive and potentially world-changing as mental health.
Mental health has been misunderstood and stigmatized for too long but fortunately that is changing and creating tremendous opportunities. Mental health is finally stepping out of the shadows and into the light.
Almost fifty years ago a similar shift took place around physical health. Jogging was a bizarre new craze in the 1970s but as more doctors and celebrities talked about the health benefits, the more people embraced it.
We believe mental fitness is the new physical fitness and we are right at the start of a hugely exciting new wave that will create multiple billion-dollars brands.
Society is finally recognizing that treating our minds with the same care and respect we do our physical bodies is vital if we are to arrest the growing mental health crisis in the Western world.
An often quoted statistic is that one in four of us will have some mental health issue at some point in our lives.
The reality is that it's actually not one in four of us but one in one.
If you have a body you will have physical health issues, if you have a mind you will have mental health issues. This subject is incredibly important and relevant for all of us.
Health care in the US is a $3 Trillion industry but only a tiny fraction of that is spent on mental health. This is changing fast.
Many smart startups are working in this space and developing solutions to improve the lives of millions of people while also building strong, sustainable and profitable companies.
Calm is one of these companies and if you're intrigued about this rapidly growing sector, we look forward to hearing from you.
We currently have a small but exceptional team and will be adding over 50 new roles in 2019. Our HQ is in San Francisco but we have team members around the world.
Calm is a rare tech startup in that it is creating a product that is good for the world but also has very strong economics (our revenue has been tripling year on year while maintaining profitability).
Talented people have their pick of hot startups to work at so we wanted to share some inside information about Calm to encourage you to join us on this extraordinary journey:
Mission: To improve the health and happiness of the world.
Vision: To create one of the most valuable and meaningful brands of the 21st Century. The Nike of the Mind.
Over $100M annual revenue run rate
10X revenue growth in the last two years.
The Top grossing Health and Fitness app in the world (source: Sensor Tower)
Over 1M paying subscribers
Profitable
19th Fastest Growing Private Company in America (Inc 5000 list)
Over 400,000 Five Star reviews in the App Stores
NPS of 74
Rated the 'World's Happiest App' by the Center for Humane Technology
2018 Apple App Trend of the Year
40M downloads (almost one new one every second)
Calm is much more than just meditation. There are over 100 hours of unique content: Daily Calm, Sleep Stories, multi-day programs. Calm Masterclasses, Calm Music, Calm Body.
The company was co-founded by entrepreneurs Alex Tew and myself (Michael Acton Smith).
We look forward to hearing from you.
Michael
