The Bangalore based Indian Bitcoin company Unocoin has raised US$ 1.5 million in pre Series-A round. This is the highest amount of money raised for a digital currency company in India. Money for Uncoin poured in from well known Indian venture capitalists like Blume Ventures, Mumbai Angels and ah! Ventures. International investors backing Uncoin include Digital Currency Group, Boost VC, Bank to the Future, Bitcoin Capital and FundersClub. The Indian Landscape – Unregulated but holds promise India is home to 1 billion plus people. It is also the world’s fastest growing economy with present and project GDP growth rate in excess of 7%. However, the Indian economy is dogged by huge inequality and is also home to world’s 21% unbanked. While technically speaking Bitcoin should hold huge potential in a country like India, the truth is that there are several stumbling blocks. One of the major problems is that Bitcoin and other virtual currencies fall in the grey zone, as far as Indian regulations and law are concerned. We talked with Sunny Ray , President of Unocoin about this issue and he mentioned a white paper by a leading techno-legal law firm, Nishith Desai and Associates which addresses these issues. “In the absence of absolute clarity, Unocoin was the first company in India to seek out and work closely with Nishith Desai and Associates to implement a comprehensive compliance and banking like framework to address these challenges,” he further adds. “Over the coming years, we expect that Bitcoin will be regulated similar to how it is being regulated in other countries. Our aim is to work with people from academia, industry, and government of India to ensure that we continue delivering on the promises of Bitcoin while systematically protecting against the downside risks. When it comes time to implement […]
