Bitwage: Revolutionizing the World of Remote Work for Over 10 Years

Over the past 10 years, Bitwage has been dedicated to accelerating financial freedom around the world, by offering the most stable and secure crypto payroll service on the market. Being the first company in the world to be fully dedicated to offering cryptocurrency payroll services, we have paid out over $350M to workers in over 100 different countries.

We have reached our tenth anniversary, and we are excited to share with you our journey to get here! We prepared this article to share important milestones and facts about the company.

🎉10 Years Providing Uninterrupted Salaries in Cryptocurrencies and Stablecoins

Bitwage started when our cofounders, Jonathan Chester and John Lindsay, who, to this day, serve as the CEO and CTO respectively, were connected because of their mutual love for Bitcoin almost 11 years ago. They saw the potential of Bitcoin as a key tool to revolutionize the way workers globally receive their salaries and payroll. Bitcoin promised to enable financial freedom in several ways. Not only could Bitcoin reduce the cost of sending money across borders by removing unneeded banking intermediaries, but it also provided a tool for people around the world to safeguard their money from inflation and untrustworthy institutions. They both adopted Bitcoin just a few years after Satoshi Nakamoto published the Bitcoin whitepaper at the end of 2008.

When Bitwage first launched, employees and freelancers alike were given the ability to receive a portion of their salary in Bitcoin. While this initially attracted US-based cryptocurrency enthusiasts who just wanted an easy way to dollar cost average their investments into Bitcoin,  it also caught the eye of freelancers from abroad working for US-based companies. Before Bitwage, freelancers or independent workers who worked in countries with high inflation indexes, like Argentina, were forced to find extreme ways to preserve the value of their income. Receiving payments for services in local currency was not worth it for Argentineans, as to this day, they can lose up to 50% of their income. The wait times on these kinds of transactions could be as long as 4-5 business days and the funds don't even reach the worker directly, instead, they go to another bank entity before hitting the worker's pockets.

As workers in countries facing high inflation and bad monetary policy began to request a portion of their salary be paid in cryptocurrency, companies needed to find a solution that could help them pay their global freelance workforces in cryptocurrency, in a fast, efficient, and compliant fashion.

Fast forward to today, Bitwage has onboarded over 90,000 workers and 4,500 companies.

Let's go through this timeline of how we have transformed and revolutionized how companies and freelancers manage salaries around the globe.

2014

It all started on May 27th, 2014 when Bitwage was first incorporated. On the 21st of July, we launched the first beta version of our Bitcoin payroll solution for US Companies paying employees. As you can imagine, this was very early for companies to adopt Bitcoin payroll, yet our cofounders realized that there was a niche market of crypto-enthusiasts who still wanted to receive their paychecks in Bitcoin. In November, Bitwage launched the ability for any employee to receive a portion of their salary in Bitcoin without their employers needing to sign up. To offer this, Bitwage offered depository bank accounts that workers could connect to their employer’s payroll system.  The product was a hit and Bitwage started to see month-over-month growth.

2015

It was in 2015 that, we processed our first million USD, one year after creating the platform.

This year, our co-founders noticed an interesting phenomenon. While most people would receive 5-20% of their salaries in Bitcoin, there was a customer segment that was receiving 100% of their salaries in Bitcoin.  This segment was international freelancers.

It turned out that freelancers abroad in many developing nations were easily losing 12% from traditional bank transfers, so some tech-savvy freelancers would earn an additional 10% of their salary by choosing to receive their whole paycheck in Bitcoin and then selling it locally at an exchange for their everyday needs.

After seeing that, our customers go through this process, we decided to automate it for them, by launching our International Payroll product in February, which would deposit local currencies into worker bank accounts, leveraging Bitcoin to move the money instead of SWIFT bank transfers, saving workers time and money. 

2015 was the year we were part of the accelerators and incubators programs for Plug and Play and Orange Silicon Valley’s Orange Fab accelerator.. That same year we also participated in an open talent competition by BBVA in New York.

Thanks to investors like Draper Associates, Orange Silicon Valley (as part of the Orange Fab accelerator), and Bitcoin Capital by Max Keiser, we managed to secure $760,00 at the end of our investor round.

2016

In 2016, we started to see significant growth in Brazil. With the corruption charges against Brazil’s president at that time, the Brazilian Real was going through high-level volatility. As a result, people could lose up to 20% of their salaries receiving money and saving in Brazilian Reals. Brazilians started coming to the Bitwage platform to get their salary in Bitcoin to save on these fees.

So we launched a solution to help Brazilian workers receive up to 20% more of their paychecks by enabling them to leverage Bitcoin to move funds into Brazil and get Brazilian Reals directly deposited into their bank accounts.

A huge milestone for 2016 was reaching the first 10 million dollars in payroll payments processed.

2017

In 2017, we won the French prize "French Tech Ticket". Which was organized by the French government in Paris. The founder and co-founder moved to Paris for the year to expand our operations across Europe. That same year Bitcoin reached a new all-time high, going from $6,000 to around $20,000. The price rise brought many new people to learn about Bitcoin and blockchain technologies, which resulted in a new phase of growth and Bitwage hitting profitability. 

2018

With a solid and structured team, we hired more staff dedicated to growth and consolidated the platform in new international markets, specifically Latin America, Europe, and Asia.

By now we had processed roughly 34 million dollars in payroll,

We launched an integration with Uphold where our users could diversify their wages in more than just fiat and cryptocurrency, they could also diversify in precious metals. And how can we forget the job portal we had this year, which had over 32,000 job offerings by December.

2019

In June 2019, we implemented the capacity to get paid in Ether. Adding new coins like Ether, on new networks like ERC-20, was greeted with positivity from our community members.

It was in this year, 1 year before the pandemic, that we started to see the Argentine market grow. As a result of high inflation, the countries' reliance on the dollar to preserve wealth, and the simultaneous restrictions on access to the dollar, people were increasingly looking to Bitcoin to save their money. As a result, many freelancers from Argentina started to use Bitwage to get their paychecks in Bitcoin, making Argentina one of our top countries to pay out to.

2020

The year of the pandemic was crucial and we experienced a boom in Argentina after implementing USDC and DAI as stablecoin options available on Bitwage. 

By 2020, we had passed the 100 million dollar mark in payroll payments processed.

2021

During 2021, there was also a large increase in American companies that paid their remote teams through the Bitwage platform. The number of American companies using Bitwage doubled in 2021.

By now, we had registered more than 50,000 users and 2,000 companies. These milestones were very well greeted in an investment round in October of 2021, where in a record time of 55 hours, Bitwage raised $1.5 million through Bnk To The Future!

Bitwage, Inc. - The leading Bitcoin & Cryptocurrency payroll, invoicing & benefits platform

Bitwage states that they are the leading provider of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency payroll, invoicing and benefits.

BnkToTheFuture.com

2022

At the beginning of 2022, we had completed a $3 million from the seed round with Draper Associates, Stellar Foundation, Gaingels, Overton VC, and BnkToTheFuture.

This year we launched integrated wallets to help users find and connect their first wallets to the platform.  Edge and Casa wallets were made available for Bitcoin deposits on the platform and the Vibrant wallet for Stellar USDC. This last partnership was possible thanks to the Stellar Foundation and to this day USDC is still one of the most used currencies by companies all over the world looking to pay wages in stablecoins on Bitwage.

New use cases emerged and athletes, including professional soccer, football, and mixed martial arts players, started using Bitwage, to receive their salaries in crypto. On-boarding athletes was part of our vision to help educate broader audiences, not just about the benefits of crypto payroll, but of the crypto ecosystem as a whole.

Argentinian UFC Athlete Guido Cannetti Joins Bitwage as an Ambassador

Bitwage is thrilled to announce their partnership with Argentinian UFC fighter Guido Cannetti. Using Bitwage, Guido will be receiving 100% of his salary in USDC stablecoin via the Stellar Network on Vibrant, which is a wallet app developed by the Stellar team specifically designed for Argentines facing inflation. For Argentinians

Blog | BitwageJonathan Chester & John Lindsay

Even though 2022 ended badly for Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies overall, mainly due to the FTX scandal, we continued to grow month-over-month!

2023

In 2023 we implemented USDT on the TRON network and on the Ethereum (ERC-20) networks to maximize the options available for companies to pay their workers.

The team continued to grow with stablecoins becoming the preferred method for companies with workers around the world.

Apart from continuing to add local currencies, we launched a brand new user experience that included a new design aesthetic, easier-to-use functionalities, and an automated, nearly instant sign-up approval process.

2024

By the end of 2024, we expect to surpass the $400 million mark on payroll transactions processed, an important milestone for us. With 10 years of uninterrupted service, we are able to provide the most stable and secure crypto payroll service in the market.

📌Milestones and Conquests

Let's share more about the most important milestones over the past 10 years regarding the volume of payroll processed.

• $1 million in payroll processed in 2015.
• $10 million in 2016.
• Began to scale Latin America in 2016.
• $1 million in the pre-seed round in 2015 with Draper Associates.
• $100 million in 2020.
• $10 million processed in Argentina in 2021
• $3 million in a seed round with Draper Associates, Stellar Foundation, Gaingels, Overton VC, and BnkToTheFuture in 2022.
• Launch of USDT in 2023.
• $400 million in 2024.

📌Product and Value

Bitwage safeguards one's economy while also paving the way to find financial freedom. Our blockchain-based tools offer a cost-effective solution to payroll, but also greatly enhance employee satisfaction and retention. 

We offer companies and individuals a service that streamlines how teams are paid globally and for individuals to invoice various clients in diversified payment options such as Bitcoin, stablecoin, and local currencies while integrating with multiple banking/payment and cryptocurrency partners, that ensure 0 downtime in a non-custodial, robust, and secure platform.

Consistency is key, and our services have been uninterrupted since the day Bitwage was first launched, which made us who we are today.

What Value do our Services Provide?

• Pay salaries based on worker preferences, including Bitcoin, stablecoins, and fiat currency. 
• Automate payroll processing for faster, cheaper, and more efficient transactions compared with traditional payroll processing.
• Tap into a global market of top-talent individuals looking for a company that values emerging technology.
• Our services are non-custodial, we do not hold your funds. 
• Safeguard from inflation and unwanted third parties.

📌Interview with Our Founders

For our tenth birthday, we interviewed our founders and the original creators of the brand. John Lindsay and Jonathan Chester share their experience and answers so we can get a better view from both aspects. Without further due, let's read what it's about:

Reflecting on the past decade, what do you consider to be the most significant milestone in the company’s history, and how did you achieve it?

• Jonathan: "Reflecting on milestones, there are several key points in the history of Bitwage. The company started when I was working at Oracle and got obsessed with Bitcoin. Not only is it one of the coolest technologies, but it is a technology that can essentially bring financial freedom around the world. Financial freedom means different things to people. For some, it means sovereignty, it means no one can take your money away. For others, it means getting more money in cross-border transactions, and for others, it's just a really easy way to conduct commerce on the Internet, in a way that is not controlled by the government. So I really liked this technology, and I started going around at Oracle, where I worked, just telling everybody that they had to get into this thing. They have to buy it, they have to research it. I ended up getting connected to my co-founder John at the time. You know this is probably the most important milestone, this one connection. We got together and started brainstorming on how we can leverage Bitcoin and the technology behind Bitcoin to save the world, or at least improve it in the ways we could see. After roughly 6 months of planning, we quit our jobs and joined the Plug and Play accelerator program, which was crucial, since they gave us a place to work and a $50k investment. In 2015, after having almost no funds left, we managed our first round of investment with Draper Associates, which let us continue moving forward. A significant event was the COVID-19 pandemic, which changed the perception of remote work and cryptocurrencies, impulsing our growth to 400% up until the end of 2023"
  
• John: "The most significant milestone is having 0 downtime for customers despite losing over 10 active banking partners and suffering over 9 hacking and DDoS attempts over 10 years. For a payroll company, zero downtime is essential for keeping our customers, but within the crypto industry, it is quite a challenging thing to achieve"

What challenges did you face in the early years of the company, and how did you overcome them to reach your current level of success?

• Jonathan: "Creating a company represents plenty of challenges, especially at the beginning, like creating a desired product, getting it known, and getting financed. At Bitwage, we wanted to make Bitcoin more accessible through salaries. This implies letting people receive payments in Bitcoin from anywhere in the world. John, with his pragmatic approach, developed a minimal viable product that let us iterate quickly. Even though the user experience was not perfect, we managed to create a product that allowed us to grow and secure finance. In terms of growth, we focused on being the first to offer a cryptocurrency payroll solution. We took advantage of platforms like Reddit and collaborated with special media outlets and social media platforms. While we were gaining traction, I joined podcasts and wrote for Forbes. This helped us build a solid base of followers in our mission of providing financial freedom that now includes stablecoins, not only Bitcoin"
  
• John: "Scaling challenges. We started on Google Cloud infrastructure and over time, the technical infrastructure was insufficient for our growth. We migrated to AWS cloud infrastructure in year 5, this enabled us to meet our growth demands. The main challenge was the data migration, and maintaining zero downtime for customers during the technical infrastructure transition."

Can you share an example of a major technological innovation introduced by your company, and how it has impacted your industry?

• Jonathan: "One of our biggest innovations was the creation of a solution to deposit accounts that allow any individual in the world to receive payments in different currencies, including Bitcoin and stablecoins. This function, which we were the first to introduce, has been replicated by other companies, showing its value and utility. Before us, no one was fully dedicated to integrating cryptocurrency into payroll. We fought an intense fight for this function to exist and be available to everyone"
  
• John: "Bitwage's core technology was built over time to be independent of a particular vendor, for both, banking and crypto partners. This allowed us to maintain zero downtime for customers despite being forced to transition between vendors. We found many competitors over time went under because their technological architecture was too tied to one vendor and then they lost the vendor.
  Another technological innovation of Bitwage was that we started with Bitcoin, and later added web3 and stablecoin technology. We found that many competitors started at the web3 or stablecoin layer, and skipped the bitcoin layer, which meant their product had less substance compared to ours."

How has your company’s commitment to social responsibility contributed to its growth and success over the past ten years?

• Jonathan: "I think it all comes down to being a mission-driven company working towards enabling financial freedom around the world. We are not a get-rich-quick scheme or fly-by-night operation pivoting to the latest money-making craze. We are focused on ensuring that we have the highest quality product available for international payroll functionality so that we can ensure that we will have 100% uptime for our customers and make it as easy and as seamless as possible. When you work with Bitwage, you are working with a company that is dedicated to the mission of enabling your financial freedom and enabling companies to get that global payroll efficiency. They are getting the 10-year experience that our team brings to the table in that combination of payroll, payments, and cryptocurrency"
• John: "Bitwage has explored over its 10 years, various new initiatives as they have arisen, both in new technologies like metaverse, as well as the eco-friendly initiatives like carbon credits and measuring carbon usage in server and data storage usage. Also, the more classic ones like diversity and inclusion. By staying abreast of the latest initiatives, Bitwage has not been surprised as the latest fashion transforms from niche to mainstream."

Looking back, what strategic decisions do you believe were crucial in steering the company toward its current achievements?

• Jonathan: "I think one of the key strategic decisions that we took is commitment to compliance. A lot of companies out there have relied entirely on other companies doing the compliance for them. So they don't register with the proper authorities in the United States to facilitate money transfers around the world or wherever they work. So our commitment to compliance means that we have built an in-house anti-money-laundering, anti-terrorist financing system, that leverages tools to help make that more efficient. So with our competitors, if something goes down, they might lose the functionality for a week, a month, or several months, but we are capable of building these deep relationships that give access to better products, better redundancy, and more compliant functionality in the united states and around the globe."
• John: "The decision not to get too attached to the latest trend but to stay true to the mission of being the best payroll and invoicing company in the space between traditional HR, payroll, cryptocurrency, and stablecoin technologies."

📌Opinions and Reviews

These are some of the reviews and most valued opinions we have gathered over the last few years. We dedicate this section to all the users and companies that have demonstrated an affinity for us and have remained with us over the years. We would like to highlight the tremendous work carried out by our support team, providing a different kind of attention, which is the reason why a good part of the reviews and opinions are aimed at them. Added to this, our platform's uptime and all the hard work our team does leaves us with a very positive score on Trustpilot of 93% with 5 stars.

📌Closing Thoughts

To finish off this journey of the growth and evolution of Bitwage, a company forged by 2 people in Standford. We now proudly have a consolidated team of over 25 fully committed, full-time individuals across the globe.

Over the years we were able to battle the technological and banking adversities inherent to our business model while remaining uninterrupted. These challenges still exist, nonetheless, our technical expertise has given us the tools to overcome these adversities and tackle new ones as well.

Our capabilities and functionalities have become robust, so that users and companies have a flexible service that facilitates payroll in the currency of choice, in a simple, compliant manner.

Happy 10 years to Bitwage,

Thank you for being with us.
-Bitwage