San Francisco, March 17, 2015 – Rakuten, Inc. (TOKYO: 4755), today announced that it plans to enable customers to choose bitcoin as a payment option by integrating Bitnet’s payment processing platform on a number of its marketplaces. The Internet services giant will begin accepting the new payment method first on Rakuten.com in the US, to be followed by Rakuten.de in Germany and Rakuten.at in Austria.



The integration with Bitnet’s platform will make Rakuten one of the largest ecommerce companies in the world to begin accepting bitcoin. In addition to offering consumers enhanced security, privacy, and convenience, Rakuten merchants will immediately see the benefits of being able to use a digital currency, including instant global reach with no cross-border fees, no price volatility, and no fraud, risk or chargebacks.



“Rakuten’s mission is to empower the world through the Internet,” commented Yaz Iida, President of Rakuten USA. “Not only can bitcoin support this vision by helping our merchants better compete globally, but it also has the potential to benefit society by enhancing the security, privacy, and convenience of financial transactions. This is one of the reasons why we invested in Bitnet last year and we look forward to working with them on our US marketplace.



John McDonnell, Co-Founder & CEO, Bitnet, said: “Rakuten’s global marketplaces are great examples of how digital currencies can impact global commerce. We’re excited to join with Rakuten in helping both merchants and shoppers reap the benefits of this new technology.”





About Rakuten:

Rakuten, Inc. (4755:Tokyo), is one of the world's leading Internet services companies. We provide a variety of products and services for consumers and businesses, with a focus on e-commerce, finance, and digital content. Since 2012, Rakuten has been ranked among the world’s ‘Top 20 Most Innovative Companies’ in Forbes magazine’s annual list. Rakuten is expanding worldwide and currently operates throughout Asia, Europe, the Americas and Oceania. Founded in 1997, Rakuten is headquartered in Tokyo, with over 14,000 employees and partner staff worldwide.

For more information: https://global.rakuten.com/corp/.



About Bitnet:

Bitnet provides a digital commerce platform enabling enterprise-scale merchants to accept bitcoin payments. Bitnet’s engineering, product, and business development team helped build and manage the world’s largest payment gateway, CyberSource (NASDAQ: CYBS), which was sold to the world’s largest payment network, Visa (NYSE: V), for $2 billion in 2010. Bitnet has offices in San Francisco, California and Belfast, Northern Ireland. For more information visit https://www.bitnet.io.