Centbee, SA Based Bitcoin Wallet and Merchant Payment Ecosystem Raises £1 million from Ayre Ventures

JOHANNESBURG, April 17, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- South African-based Bitcoin company, Centbee, announced today that it has closed its Series A round with entrepreneur Calvin Ayre, founder of Antigua-based investment firm, Ayre Ventures and CoinGeek. Ayre, who has invested £1 million (R18.3 million), announced that, "Centbee has a track record of making Bitcoin easily usable and accessible to everyone including merchants and consumers. They support the original Bitcoin protocol in the form of Bitcoin SV, and have demonstrated an extraordinary ability to attract users and we're proud to support their further growth."

The deal was facilitated by nChain, leading blockchain advisory, research and development firm, which previously took an equity stake in Centbee in January 2018.

Jimmy Nguyen, Chair of nChain Group's Strategic Advisory Board and Founding President of the Bitcoin Association (which advances Bitcoin SV's global ecosystem) remarked: "Centbee has one of the most user-friendly Bitcoin wallets and merchant payment solutions we have seen. It is built using the original Bitcoin protocol, now alive only in the form of Bitcoin SV, which has a plan for massive blockchain scaling. This enables Centbee to offer low fees and fast transaction speeds. We will continue to work with Centbee as it sparks greater merchant and consumer adoption of Bitcoin BSV in Africa and worldwide."

Ayre's investment is part of a broader collaboration to advance the Bitcoin SV ecosystem. nChain will also support Centbee with its technical consulting services and access to its vast intellectual property portfolio (which is aimed at benefiting growth of the BSV blockchain).

Centbee is a Bitcoin wallet provider that makes it easy for consumers to acquire, store and spend Bitcoin with retailers and other merchants. Centbee supports Bitcoin SV because it is the only blockchain that fulfils the original Bitcoin design and protocol. Based in South Africa, Centbee was founded by co-CEOs, Lorien Gamaroff and Angus Brown. Gamaroff is a leading expert in blockchain technologies and cryptocurrencies. He has consulted and advised regulators and corporates internationally and is highly regarded globally as an educator and presenter. Brown has 20 years' experience in payments and banking including the role of CEO of eBucks.com, a world-first bank-backed digital currency created in 2000.

"Centbee has made it easy for customers to buy Bitcoin SV easily at over 50 000 till points in South Africa," says Brown. "Through this, we will help people move money simply and cheaply across borders to support family and friends. The investment will be used for product development, scaling and growth."

 Gamaroff is pleased with the progress made over the last few months at Centbee, "Our development roadmap is well defined with exciting payment and remittance products coming to market this year. We look forward to the next phase in our growth and development."

Centbee is a gold member of AlphaCode, powered by Rand Merchant Investment Holdings, which identifies, partners and grows disruptive and scalable fintech businesses. Head of AlphaCode, Dominique Collett said: "We are delighted that Centbee has attracted the interest of two of the world's most prestigious investors in the cryptocurrency and blockchain space. It certainly augurs well for the growth and development of Centbee and Bitcoin SV globally."

The Centbee Wallet is available in the Apple and Google Play stores.

About Ayre Group

Founded by entrepreneur Calvin Ayre, the Ayre Group has investments and interests across the world. With a passion for content and publishing, fintech, real estate and property in seven countries around the world, Ayre Group supports and drives the world's most disruptive innovations.

Website: ayre.ag

About nChain Group

The nChain Group is the global leader in advisory, research and development of blockchain technologies. Its mission is to enable massive growth and worldwide adoption of Bitcoin SV, the original Bitcoin protocol as represented in Satoshi Nakamoto's whitepaper - focusing on Bitcoin SV as the true Bitcoin.

Website: nChain.com

About Centbee

Centbee is a fintech startup based in South Africa, that builds products and services that make it easy to send, store and spend Bitcoin. Their vision is to help users pay for real-world goods and services using Bitcoin payment processes. The Centbee wallet, available in the App Store and Google Play store, enables the purchase of Bitcoin SV at till-points in over 50 000 retailers across South Africa. Centbee Remit makes it easy to send money across borders in less than one minute.

Website: centbee.com

About Bitcoin SV

Bitcoin Satoshi Vision (BSV) is the only Bitcoin implementation that follows the original Satoshi Nakamoto whitepaper, and conforms to the original Bitcoin protocol and design. BSV is the only public blockchain that maintains the original vision for Bitcoin and will massively scale to become the world's new money and enterprise blockchain.

Website: bitcoinsv.io

About Bitcoin Association

Bitcoin Association is the leading global organization for Bitcoin business. It brings together merchants, exchanges, application developers, enterprises, miners and others in the Bitcoin ecosystem to advance the growth of Bitcoin commerce. Bitcoin Association supports Bitcoin SV (BSV) as the original Bitcoin. As an inclusive organization, it welcomes companies and organizations who support or wish to learn about BSV and Satoshi Vision, even if you also support other cryptocurrency or blockchain projects.

Website: https://bitcoinassociation.net/

Upcoming: Coingeek Toronto Conference ? May 29-30, Toronto, Canada

Come learn more about what Bitcoin can do with "No Limits" and the latest on-chain scaling developments with Bitcoin SV at the CoinGeek Toronto conference May 29-30.  It's easy to register.  And pay with the world's new money and you'll receive a discount by using BSV via Coingate.

SOURCE Centbee