NY-DIGITAL-CURRENCY
9.9.2020 12:02:09 CEST | Business Wire | Press release
Digital Currency Group (DCG), a global enterprise that builds, buys, and invests in blockchain companies, today announced the acquisition of Luno , a leading cryptocurrency exchange. Based in London and with regional hubs in Singapore and Cape Town, Luno has grown significantly in recent years, with nearly 400 employees and more than five million global customers spanning over 40 countries. New York-based DCG will be making a significant financial commitment to help Luno expand globally, both in geographies where Luno currently operates and beyond. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Led by co-founder and CEO Marcus Swanepoel, Luno has become a digital asset powerhouse in many emerging and frontier markets, providing digital asset education, knowledge, and investment tools for individuals in Africa, Asia, and Europe. Luno has helped broaden the global crypto investment community and the company has seen record growth of its customer base in 2020. Luno is a leading exchange in several countries that have the highest percentage of cryptocurrency ownership, including South Africa (third-highest percentage of its citizens owning digital currencies), Nigeria (fifth-highest), Indonesia (sixth-highest), and Malaysia (tenth-highest).1
DCG is an investment firm that has backed more than 160 blockchain companies around the world. In addition to its venture portfolio, DCG is the parent company of several wholly-owned subsidiaries, including Grayscale Investments (the world’s largest digital currency asset manager), Genesis (a leading digital asset prime brokerage), CoinDesk (the preeminent media and events company in the industry), and the recently-launched Foundry , which provides institutional expertise, capital, and market intelligence to bitcoin miners and manufacturers.
DCG first invested in Luno in its seed round in 2014.
“We are proud to have supported Luno as an early investor, and we recognize a shared commitment to building mission-driven companies that can help transform traditional financial services and improve economic freedom for people all over the world,” said DCG Founder and CEO Barry Silbert. “Luno is a high growth, global business and there is a massive opportunity to expand organically and through acquisitions.”
DCG enables its subsidiaries to operate as independent companies, providing leadership, partnership, and investment capital to help scale the businesses. The Luno leadership team will remain entirely intact and Swanepoel will lead acquisition efforts in his role as CEO.
“The past seven years have been an incredibly exciting journey for Luno – helping millions of our customers get access to crypto for the first time,” said Swanepoel. “DCG has been an integral part of the Luno story during all of this time, and we’ve been fully aligned on our vision and culture since day one. Having the full backing of DCG just as we’re experiencing such a pivotal moment of growth in the industry is not just an exciting and important milestone for Luno, but more importantly it will significantly accelerate our ability to reach our goal to help upgrade 1 billion people to a better financial system by 2030.”
“We have been extremely impressed with Marcus and the Luno team since we made our initial investment,” added Silbert. “Marcus understands our culture and appreciates how well Luno fits into the DCG family. He is a focused, high integrity leader and exactly the kind of person we want running one of our companies at this critical moment when the crypto industry is at an inflection point.”
Founded in 2013, Luno has been backed by global tech giant the Naspers Group and Balderton Capital amongst others. During these last seven years, Luno has maintained its commitment to upgrading the world to a better financial system. The company believes that the legacy system was built for a non-digital age, ignoring the needs of modern individuals and adding unnecessary inefficiencies and gatekeepers. The world now has access to new technologies like Bitcoin and Ethereum that will fundamentally change how the world views and uses money. Like communication evolving from landlines to mobile phones, money is finally catching up with other information revolutions.
Luno maintains regional offices in Kuala Lumpur, Lagos, Jakarta, and Johannesburg, and will continue to focus on the existing geographies where it operates across Europe, Africa, and Asia. The Luno team has also developed an aggressive road map for future growth and will ultimately compete with financial services firms globally. Luno is actively hiring for positions all over the world.
About Digital Currency Group
DCG is a global enterprise that builds, buys, and invests in blockchain companies all over the world. Founded in 2015 by CEO Barry Silbert, DCG is the most active investor in the blockchain sector, with a mission to accelerate the development of a better financial system through the proliferation of digital assets and blockchain technology.
Today, DCG sits at the epicenter of the industry, backing more than 160 companies in 35 countries. DCG also invests directly in digital currencies and other digital assets.
In addition to its investment portfolio, DCG is the parent company of Grayscale Investments, Genesis, CoinDesk, and Foundry.
About Luno
Luno is a leading global cryptocurrency company on a mission to upgrade the world to a better financial system.
Co-founded by CEO Marcus Swanepoel and CTO Timothy Stranex, Luno launched in 2013 and has built a team of nearly 400 with its headquarters in London with regional hubs in Singapore and Cape Town. With over 5 million customers spanning in over 40 countries, Luno’s products and services make it safe and easy to buy, sell, store and learn about cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum.
1 Source: Digital 2020: Global Digital Overview
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200909005262/en/
About Business Wire
Subscribe to releases from Business Wire
Subscribe to all the latest releases from Business Wire by registering your e-mail address below. You can unsubscribe at any time.
Latest releases from Business Wire
U.S. FDA Grants Priority Review to BeOne Medicines’ TEVIMBRA in First-Line HER2+ GEA29.4.2026 12:00:00 CEST | Press release
TEVIMBRA plus ZIIHERA and chemotherapy regimen delivered statistically significant median OS of 26.4 months, an unprecedented result in this challenging diseaseResults from the global Phase 3 HERIZON-GEA-01 study demonstrate potential to change clinical practice in advanced HER2+ gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma BeOne Medicines Ltd. (Nasdaq: ONC; HKEX: 06160; SSE: 688235), a global oncology company, today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Priority Review to a supplemental Biologics License Application (sBLA) for TEVIMBRA® (tislelizumab) in combination with ZIIHERA® (zanidatamab) and chemotherapy for the first-line treatment of unresectable locally advanced/metastatic HER2-positive (HER2) gastric, gastroesophageal junction, or esophageal adenocarcinoma. The FDA has also granted Breakthrough Therapy Designation to the regimen of ZIIHERA in combination with fluoropyrimidine- and platinum-containing chemotherapy, with and without TEVIMBRA, in this indica
European Commission (EC) Approves Henlius and Organon’s POHERDY® (pertuzumab), the First Approved Biosimilar to PERJETA (pertuzumab) in Europe29.4.2026 11:30:00 CEST | Press release
Shanghai Henlius Biotech, Inc. (2696.HK), and Organon (NYSE: OGN) today announced the European Commission (EC) has granted marketing authorization for POHERDY® (pertuzumab) 420 mg/14 mL injection for intravenous use, the first and only approved biosimilar to PERJETA (pertuzumab) in Europe, for all indications of the reference product.1 This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260429686426/en/ “As the first, and currently the only, pertuzumab biosimilar in Europe, the EC’s approval of POHERDY marks an important milestone in expanding access to treatments for patients with certain HER2-positive breast cancers, particularly as breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer among women in the European Union,” said Joe Azzinaro, Vice President, Global Commercial Lead Biosimilars, at Organon.2,3 “Organon’s growing global portfolio of biosimilars reinforces our ongoing commitment to supporting the sustainability of healt
Andreas Goppelt Appointed Managing Director of OrphaCare29.4.2026 10:27:00 CEST | Press release
OrphaCare, a global specialist for the development and marketing of medical devices for drug delivery and part of the AOP Health Group, has appointed Andreas Goppelt as its new Managing Director, succeeding Georg Fischer. In this role, the seasoned medical device expert will focus on broadening the company’s strategic scope and driving its next phase of growth. OrphaCare plays a key role in supporting AOP Health’s integrated therapies approach, and the Group’s long-term expansion. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260429303533/en/ Portrait Andreas Goppelt, Managing Director OrphaCare (copyright: AOP Health/Studio Koekart) Andreas Goppelt brings more than 25 years of leadership experience across MedTech, biotechnology and the pharmaceutical industry. He has a proven track record of driving innovation, scaling global organizations, and delivering growth in highly regulated healthcare environments. In his new role,
The Jury Has Been Announced for the Third Edition of the Reply AI Film Festival, Dedicated to the Best Short Films Generated With Artificial Intelligence29.4.2026 10:00:00 CEST | Press release
Gabriele Salvatores, together with Rob Minkoff, Catherine Hardwicke, Jed Weintrob, Christina Lee Storm, Nils Hartmann, Guillem Martinez Roura, Filippo Rizzante, Giacomo Mineo, Brian Welk and Denise Negri, will judge the short films in competition based on creativity, production quality and the use of Artificial Intelligence. Reply [EXM, STAR: REY], an international group specialized in creating new business models enabled by AI and long committed to guiding younger generations in exploring emerging technologies, presents the jury of the third edition of the Reply AI Film Festival, the international competition aimed at creatives, directors, and filmmakers who want to challenge themselves in producing short films created using Artificial Intelligence tools. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260429288361/en/ “Imaginatio Nova” is the theme of the 2026 edition, an invitation to explore a new phase of imagination, wh
Bregal Milestone Announces Majority Growth Investment in CoreGo, a Leading European Open-Loop Payment and Event Technology Company29.4.2026 10:00:00 CEST | Press release
Investment follows over 98% annual growth and supports CoreGo’s continued market expansion Bregal Milestone, a leading European software growth private equity firm, today announced a majority strategic growth investment in CoreGo Oy ("CoreGo" or the "Company"), a leading provider of open-loop payments and integrated technology solutions for festivals, sports events, and venues across Europe. This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260427991105/en/ Founded in Helsinki in 2015 by Hannu Elomaa and CTO Nikoteemu Väänänen, CoreGo has built one of Europe's most differentiated open-loop payment infrastructure and event technology businesses. Serving approximately 250 customers across the Nordics and DACH region, the Company delivers an integrated showtime-critical suite of solutions through CoreGo Cloud, unifying payments, access, networks, and data into a single real-time operating system. CoreGo’s in-house private network
In our pressroom you can read all our latest releases, find our press contacts, images, documents and other relevant information about us.
Visit our pressroom