Latitude, a global payments infrastructure company, has launched, alongside an $8 million seed round led by NEA with participation from Lightspeed Faction, Coinbase Ventures, Paxos, Bitso, and Solana Foundation. Founded by former officials from Stripe, Coinbase, Uber, Zero Hash, and Facebook, Latitude is addressing one of the most persistent failures in global commerce: sending money across borders.
Despite operating in a 24/7 global economy, businesses still rely on legacy banking rails that take two to five business days to settle payments, hide fees across intermediaries, and require fragmented providers by region. Paying someone internationally can feel closer to mailing a check than sending a digital payment.
The regulatory fog has lifted. With the U.S. establishing the first federal framework for stablecoin payments, the rails are finally clear, and demand for a full-stack blockchain-native solution that can move money globally, instantly, and compliantly is surging. The moment extends beyond stablecoins as new payment use cases emerge. AI agents will default to the simplest and most programmatic stack. Merchants selling globally will favor the most reliable, affordable, and cost-effective local-currency solution. Latitude was built for exactly this moment.
Latitude’s founding team has Uber, Stripe, Coinbase experience
CEO Cyril Mathew spent more than a decade at the intersection of payments and stablecoins. At Uber, he led international driver and payment partnerships. At Coinbase, he led USDC growth. At Stripe, he led the launch of creator payouts via stablecoins across more than 100 countries.
“Global payments shouldn’t operate on infrastructure designed for a different era,” said Mathew. “Uber taught me that gig workers need money now. Coinbase taught me that crypto needs simplicity. Stripe taught me that stablecoins need local-currency connectivity to matter.
“Each company gave me a lesson the next one needed, and Latitude is where they all land. A fully regulated platform with stablecoins as the engine and local currency as the destination, moving money across borders instantly, and at a fraction of what businesses pay today.”
Co-founder and CTO Brian Wrightson was an early engineer in adtech and targeting at Facebook before building enterprise products at Stripe. Vivek Morzaria worked on business and corporate development at Uber, Lime and OpenSea.
Together, the team brings 25 years of combined experience in payments, fintech, and financial infrastructure. Having scaled payments across some of the world’s most ambitious companies, the team kept hitting the same wall: moving money globally was still slow, opaque, and broken.
What Latitude does
Global Payouts offers a flat rate of 50bps in every market it serves, the interbank FX rate guaranteed, instant settlement to local bank accounts in fiat, and onboarding in days, not months. No volume commitments or hidden spreads.
Underpinning this is the Latitude Liquidity Network, a modern settlement infrastructure combining stablecoin rails, built-in compliance, and direct local payout connectivity across more than 50 countries, built from the ground up on new financial rails rather than legacy infrastructure. For fintechs and digital wallets building on stablecoins, Latitude’s embeddable on/off ramps tap directly into this network, providing local bank-to-stablecoin connectivity with minimal integration friction and competitive fees.
“In fintech, regulatory clarity and technical innovation rarely arrive at the same time, but that’s exactly what’s happening now,” said Rick Yang, partner and head of technology investing at NEA. “I’ve seen what it takes to win in financial infrastructure and payments. I believe Latitude has the regulatory depth, the technical architecture, and most importantly, the team that an opportunity like this demands.”
Latitude achievements
- A real-time liquidity & payout network spanning 50 countries, wired natively with stablecoin liquidity so funds arrive in local currency, instantly
- 38 state money transmission licenses or approvals secured
- Direct integrations into major stablecoin issuers and U.S. bank partners: no middlemen, no legacy overhead, no hidden markups
- Two products live, a third on the launchpad: global payouts for platforms, consumer on/off ramps built on local payment methods, and business dollar accounts for companies moving money across borders