Polygon Labs is set to buy crypto payments platform Coinme and crypto infrastructure company Sequence for a combined price of over $250 million, as it is planning to establish a profitable stablecoin payments business in the world.
Author : Akshita Jain | EQmint | Finance News
These acquisitions are at a time when the sector is in a favourable regulatory environment in the United States (US), and plans are being made to expand into markets that will be regulated.
The company also plans to enter the Middle East, Latin America and Europe, said Sandeep Nailwal, the founder of Polygon Foundation, Business Standard.
“Polygon Labs will become increasingly payment-oriented and will be a real profitable business on the payment side, and enable transactions on Polygon. That’s what produces the stronger network effects and modes for Polygon,” he said.
Together with Polygon, the firms have handled over $1 billion in off-chain sales and over $2 trillion in on-chain value transfers. Polygon Chain capitalises on this upside, as payment activity increases, while gaining on-chain throughput and network fees, directly benefiting stakers and validators.
Coinme
It was founded in 2014 as one of the first licensed digital currency exchanges in the United States, providing money-transmitter licenses and compliance infrastructure that can operate in 48 U.S. states, anda regulated whitelabel crypto-as-a-service offering for fintechs, businesses, and payment applications. It also has a physical fiat-to-crypto network with over 50,000 retail outlets, a licensed wallet infrastructure, and enterprise APIs and SDKs.
Coinme, funded by Pantera, Digital Currency Group (DCG), Coinstar, Circle Ventures and MoneyGram, serves Exodus, Coinstar, Baanx, and over a million Coinme payments app customers in the enterprise.
Sequence
The company also includes smart wallets and a 1-click cross-chain orchestration and intents engine that allows for the automation of crypto payment across networks without requiring users to handle bridging, swaps, or gas. Sequence has been backed by major investors, including Brevan Howard Digital, Initialised Capital, Coinbase, Polychain, Consensys, Take-Two Interactive, Ubisoft and Bitkraft.
It also provides wallet and application infrastructure across major blockchain ecosystems, such as Polygon, Immutable, Monad, Magic Eden, and Arbitrum, and it supports emerging networks such as SKALE, Etherlink, ApeChain, Soneium and Somnia, as well as using Google Cloud as a partner and distribution channel.
Trails
The company is powered by Sequence and offers universal rails for 1-click crypto transactions and payments across any chain, token and wallet. Trails supports blockchains like Katana, prediction markets like Foresight, and interoperability and seamless stablecoin payments via Circle’s Cross-Chain Transfer Protocol.
Polygon Labs Strengthens Payments Stack
Sandeep Nailwal added that existing investors in the acquired firms would continue to invest in the company after the acquisition. “These acquisitions are being made by Polygon Labs, which builds middleware on top of the blockchain. All these features (from the acquisitions) add up to a lot of value for Polygon Labs, which can provide services on top of the chain,” Nailwal said.
The firm said Coinme allows money-transmitter licenses and compliance infrastructure in 48 states. It is a physical fiat-to-crypto network with over 50,000 retail locations and a licensed wallet infrastructure.
Sequence facilitates smart wallets and cross-chain orchestration to help crypto payment flows.
“Polygon has never won in meme coins and speculative markets. But it has always been a winner in gaining adoption, where there are some real-world use cases being done. “Whether it’s the tokenisation or the stablecoin-related payments, Polygon is generally the best on this scale,” Nailwal explained.
Stablecoins and India
Nailwal noted that the domestic payments market in India was largely dominant with the country’s real-time payments system, Unified Payments Interface (UPI), and adoption of stablecoin may still be far from home.
They would have a clear advantage over UPI in cross-border payment flows.
“If there was an India stablecoin, one could directly receive (in) India stablecoin, whether it’s Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC)-backed or direct or whatever, that can accelerate this thing (adoption). “I still don’t see stable coins doing anything very well in the domestic markets of India, because the Indian financial infrastructure is top of the world,” he said.
Stablecoins are not legal tender in India. But the RBI is pushing to adopt its own CBDC.
He added that the firm was working with local partners in India to help cross-border trading of stablecoins.
“How do you make a consumer app? It’s a completely different ballgame. We would love to work with someone who is available, and most likely that’s how we will do it,” he said.
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