Austin-based blockchain startup Factom, known for leveraging the bitcoin blockchain for projects including plans to secure land titles in Honduras, has raised over $8 million as a part of its extended Series A funding round.
In October 2016, Factom raised $4.2 million in its Series A round, led by prolific industry investor Tim Draper of Draper Associates. At the time, the company revealed the new finances would be used toward bringing in new personnel and the development of new Factom applications.
“This round of funding allows us to aggressively grow the company and the underlying technology,” stated Factom CEO and co-founder Peter Kirby at the time.
Public records filed on Tuesday now reveal that the Texas-based startup has raised just a total of $8,027,535 to add to the funding round, closing its Series A this week. According to AustinInno, the latest investors include Peeli Ventures, Harvest Equity and several unnamed investors based in Austin.
During its launch in 2014, Factom published its whitepaper, revealing its aim to secure data with a data-keeping layer of record on the bitcoin blockchain. The process sees Factom’s protocol providing a decentralized public data layer, as the data is kept off the ledger initially. Factom then complies the data in a merkle tree anchor prior to publishing it on the bitcoin blockchain every 10 seconds.
Despite the much-publicized relative failure of the stalled Honduras project, the startup is working with the Chinese government toward a smart-city initiative.
“[W]e’re working with partners to build Smart City systems secured by the blockchain,” said CEO Kirby in a previous interview with CCN.com. “Every data point gets logged in an immutable database.”
Factom’s latest commercial release takes aim at the mortgage industry, with the launch of Factom Harmony . Enabling users to create and store permanent mortgage records, the solution acts as an incorruptible, transparent record for loan documents in the mortgage process.
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