After winning the first prize at TechCrunch’s Hardware Battlefield(read our story here) in Las Vegas last January, Slovenian hardware startup CubeSensors recently announced raising 700.000 dollars in aseed round from the founders of BitStamp, the largest Bitcoin exchange platform in the world.
Seed funding
The funding, which came in the form of virtual currency bitcoin, is the first major investment for Nejc Kodrič and Damijan Merlak, who cofounded BitStamp in 2011 in Slovenia. Their company, now based in the UK, recently received The Europas award for the best European crypto startup.
Reached by inventures.eu, Alja Isaković, CubeSensors Outreach, stressed that the investment comes from the founders of BitStamp, not from the company itself. “It’s a great example of how founders can support other founders, especially in a small country like ours,” she said.
According to Isaković, the funding will provide a great opportunity for a faster growth. After bootstrapping for more than two years, the startup, which has already customers in over forty countries, will indeed use this investment to scale up the production, grow their team, and bring products into the hands of customers faster.
“Right now, we’re focusing on catching up with the demand for our product. We have a lot of existing pre-orders to fulfil. And we’re of course working on improving our existing Cubes and developing new ideas,” she added.
Opening up to new currencies
In addition to fiat currencies, bitcoins can now be used on CubeSensors website to purchase the Cubes. The company is one of the first in the region enabling this way of payment, as well as one of the few businesses that have received funding in bitcoins so far.
Although it is too soon to estimate what percentage of sales will actually be done in bitcoins, Isaković said the team is excited about providing their potential customers with more options outside of traditional payment providers.
Smart cubes
Launched by Ales Spetic and Marko Mrdjenovic last year, CubeSensors makes smart devices that help people to understand and monitor their indoor environment. Packed with sensors, the Cube measures, well, pretty much everything that is measurable in a room: temperature, humidity, air quality, light, noise and barometric pressure. Data are gathered and analysed by an app, telling users how to optimise their living or working setting for a better, healthier lifestyle.
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