Stripe expands into eight new European markets

Payments technology company Stripe is set to expand its services into eight new countries, with the growth driven from its Dublin office.

The company, which was founded by Limerick brothers Patrick and John Collison, is expanding into Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Greece and Portugal.

Businesses can also use Stripe for accounting, billing, payments to third parties and mobile payment optimisation. The platform also helps protect against fraud, with machine learning and security safeguards to guard against against fraudulent transactions.

The company said its expansion would allow internet businesses in the countries named to start, grow and scale their business globally, accepting more than 130 currencies from anywhere in the world. The Eastern European region has a high density of software developers, with 1.3 developers for every 100 people in the overall workforce.

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Empower

"Central and Eastern Europe has a lot of entrepreneurial and technological talent, and we believe even more of its companies could be expanding globally," says Felix Huber, head of Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa, at Stripe. "Stripe aims to empower more companies from this region to export their creativity and ambition to the rest of the world."

Stripe now employs more than 2,000 people and serves more than a million users around the world. It is on track to have 300 employees in Dublin by the end of the year.

The company also announced two new products for US businesses – Stripe Capital, which will give businesses using Stripe easier access to funds, and Stripe Corporate Card, which will help its clients to manage employees’ spending.

Stripe has also hired former Salesforce executive Eileen O'Mara as head of revenue and growth for Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Ms O'Mara will be based in Stripe's engineering hub in Dublin.

The appointment follows the hiring of Matt Henderson earlier this year to lead product strategy in Europe, heading up the company's European engineering operations.