In 2020, Verve Ventures invested in the Series A financing round of digital asset custody startup Metaco. Today, three years later, Metaco was acquired by US crypto solution provider Ripple.

Swiss startup Metaco was founded in 2015 by Adrien Treccani and Nicolas Dorier. The company’s mission is to help financial institutions building their digital asset operations. Metaco’s core product enables them to store, trade, issue and manage any type of digital assets, such as crypto and digital currencies and securities with the highest possible security.

In 2018, Metaco raised funds from core banking software provider Avaloq’s VC arm and the telecom company Swisscom, as well as other investors. In 2020, Metaco raised USD 17 million in a Series A financing round led by the security company Giesecke + Devrient that was joined by Standard Chartered Bank and Zurich Cantonal Bank. Verve Ventures participated in the financing round based on the fact that already a few large global clients put their trust in Metaco’s solution. 

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At the time, the startup had 20 employees, more than half of them software engineers with strong backgrounds in the field of digital assets and security. “What ultimately convinced us were the credentials of the founders Adrien and Nicolas and that they managed to assemble a top-notch team around them,” says Romeo Bütler, Principal at Verve Ventures. Nicolas Dorier is one of the few experts that maintain and develop the core components of the Bitcoin network, and Adrien Treccani has a Ph.D. in Finance from SFI Swiss Finance Institute.

Since Verve’s investment, Metaco has convinced many more customers and grown to more than 100 employees.

“Metaco is a proven leader in institutional digital asset custody with an exceptional executive bench and a truly unmatched customer track record,” said Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of Ripple in the press release announcing the transaction. In a call with CNBC, he said that Ripple invested $250 million of cash off its own balance sheet to fund the acquisition.

The aquirer Ripple Labs is a US-based technology company providing enterprise crypto solutions. Founded in 2012, Ripple has offices across the globe and runs a payments network that includes over 300 customers across 40+ countries and six continents. Ripple has raised over USD 290 million in total.