Blockchain businesses will now be able to apply for Mastercard’s startup incubation program. The first round of applicants will include French card issuer Kulipa and British blockchain infrastructure startup Parfin.
Since its 2014 debut, Mastercard has helped more than 400 businesses from 50 countries through its Start Path program. After completing the program, these companies have raised more than $15 billion in donations.
The massive provider of payment card services has extended the initiative to include start-ups creating decentralized tech. Mastercard plans to provide a four-month program under the Start Path Blockchain and Digital Assets Program to assist the first five entrepreneurs in expanding use cases and providing the best possible user experience.
Mastercard will put the five in touch with fintech and payments specialists to investigate how their blockchain solutions may address issues in the real world outside of their initial target areas.
“As digital assets become increasingly mainstream, Mastercard is embracing opportunities to support and collaborate with startups to build the future of blockchain and digital assets innovation through the Start Path startup engagement program,” stated Sabrina Tharani, SVP of Global Fintech Programs at Mastercard.
Among the five is Kulipa, a French firm that offers a cryptocurrency payment card for non-custodial wallets that integrates with Google Pay (NASDAQ: GOOGL) and Apple Pay (NASDAQ: AAPL).
“Through Mastercard Start Path, we have the opportunity to discover new ways to expand financial inclusion with convenient and global stablecoin payments,” stated founder Axel Cateland.
Other companies include Belgium’s Venly, which provides a Web3 platform for developers; Singapore-based Peaq, which focuses on decentralized physical infra networks (DePIN); U.S.-based Triangle, whose blockchain solutions cater to the carbon credit market; and the United Kingdom’s Parfin, whose services enable mainstream financial firms to integrate blockchain rails.
Mastercard’s Tharani continued, “This dynamic set of startups will receive access to our network of partners, including mentorship opportunities and resources to support them to scale their solutions and reach new markets,”
In light of the impending upheaval to the financial services sector, Mastercard is still making investments in blockchain technology. It collaborated on the creation of a “DeFi credit card” a week ago with Kima, an Israeli P2P blockchain payments system.
In addition, Mastercard continues to apply for blockchain patents and has collaborated on blockchain tokenization with other major firms including JPMorgan (NASDAQ: JPM) and Citigroup (NASDAQ: C).
