A former CEO of Visa (UK & Ireland), Marc O'Brien, is now in charge of Crypterium (CRPT), an Estonia-based FinTech startup with the ambitious goal of making crypto mainstream. On 10 August 2018, the company announced that you could now use its app to send crypto instantly to anyone who has a mobile phone. Here was the tweet it sent out:

Want to experience the fastest and the most convenient way of transferring crypto anywhere in the world? Then try out our newly-released-killer-app feature! You can now send any amount of cryptocurrency by just putting in a phone number https://t.co/7YEJkmN4UC — Crypterium (@crypterium) August 10, 2018

Crypterium’s announcement says that it challenges traditional banks with a “new feature that allows its users to transfer any amount of cryptocurrency using not the complicated wallet addresses, but simply the recipient phone number”. It also says that these transfers happen virtually instantly, and that it can handle up to a million such transactions per second.

Crypterium’s CEO says:

“We’re on our way to the 21st century’s 'Netscape moment', the day when a California startup’s eye-popping market debut illuminated the World Wide Web for millions of people, otherwise only vaguely familiar with its potential and promise.”

He goes to say that Crypterium “makes buying, selling and spending of cryptocurrency in everyday life as easy as possible, and that’s what will bring the next billions of people to using crypto.”

Crypterium believes that there are two problems facing crypto holders who wish to send someone crypto:

Wallet addresses can be confusing.

Transactions can be slow.

Its app tries to solve both of these problems.

First:

“There is no need to copy the recipient’s wallet address. You just need to know his or her phone number. Send crypto to your mom, your friend, your ex-girlfriend in France. They will get money even if they don’t have any crypto wallets. Once the transaction is processed, they’ll get an SMS with a link to get their crypto with some very clear instructions on what they can do with it. For example, they can use their newly acquired Bitcoin to top up their mobile phones.”

Second:

“What is even more great, the transaction of any cryptocurrency takes seconds. This has become possible because all transfers are done off-chain. When the user wants to spend the coins externally, the money is withdrawing from the sender’s wallet inside Crypterium. While not spent, all the transactions are written in the system, make the transfer the fastest of all.”

O’Brien says:

“We have analyzed the most popular crypto wallets in the market, and none of them offer anything like it, though it sounds so exciting.”

Here is what the interface of the app (available for both iOS and Android) looks like:

Once you have competed a simple KYC form (full name, gender, date of birth, nationality), assuming you have some crypto in your BTC, ETH, or LTC Crypterium wallets, you can send BTC/ETH/LTC to anyone in the world using either their wallet address or their phone number. In the case of the latter, an appropriate wallet will automatically created for the receipient and he/she will get notified via a text message.

What makes Crypterium even more exciting is what it plans to offer next: a way to pay in crypto in shops all over the world: “You will be able to get a virtual card in Crypterium App, link it to Apple Pay, Samsung Pay or Android Pay, bind it to your crypto account and pay at any NFC terminal, or via scanning the QR codes.”

The company’s COO, Austin Kimm, during an AMA session on 7 August 2018, stated:

“The holy grail of payments is to be able to pay at NFC terminals in stores with Crypterium App. Our partner is now on board, we are working very closely with that partner. We are also very close with Visa and MasterCard. We expect to have that launched early in October.”

Featured Image Credit: Image Courtesy of Crypterium