payments

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Led by Andreessen Horowitz, Payments Startup Dwolla Raises $16.5 Million

Mike Isaac in Commerce on April 30 at 10:02 am PT

Payments startup Dwolla announced Tuesday it raised a $16.5 million round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with AH partner Scott Weiss to join Dwolla’s board. Former investors USV, Thrive and Village Ventures also participated in the round. Dwolla has built its own payments network, circumventing the usual fees associated with ACH networks (long used by credit card companies), charging 25 cents per money transfer.

News Byte

Payments Startup Balanced Raises $2 Million

Mike Isaac in Commerce on April 2 at 5:00 am PT

Balanced, a startup that focuses on bringing payments systems to network-based companies like Airbnb and Kickstarter, announced Tuesday that it raised $2 million in venture capital. Andreessen Horowitz participated in the round, along with CollabFund and a number of current and former Facebook employees. The ten-person startup had already raised $1.4 million in funds from Ashton Kutcher, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky and Reddit CEO Yishan Wong, among others.

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Social Commerce Start-Up Chirpify Extends Payments Platform to Instagram

Mike Isaac in Commerce on October 23, 2012 at 12:24 am PT

Social Web commerce platform Chirpify now supports in-stream payments on Instagram, the company announced on Tuesday. The company first began as a way for merchants to sell items to followers on Twitter from within the stream, only requiring buyers to “@reply” to sellers with simple commands like “Buy” or “Donate.” The launch on the new Instagram platform comes complete with a number of celebrity merchants touting their wares.