Digital Asset Holdings ‘Acquihires’ Two Blockchain Startups

Digital Asset Holdings (DAH), led by former JPMorgan executive Blythe Masters, has ‘acquihired’ two blockchain startups to expand its portfolio of supported ledger technologies.

DAH plans to build software for financial institutions to trade digital currencies, as well as develop financial applications powered by the Bitcoin blockchain. It was founded earlier this year by Don Wilson, CEO of proprietary trading firm DRW Trading, and Sunil Hirani, the CEO of trueEX LLC, an exchange for interest rate swaps.

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One of the startups, Hyperledger, specializes in shared ledgers for decentralized record management. Its CEO, Dan O’Prey, will become Chief Marketing Officer at DAH, and its CTO, Daniel Feichtinger, will join the senior engineering team.

Hyperledger was a finalist at this year’s SWIFT Innotribe startup challenge, which was ultimately won by another Bitcoin startup, Bitspark, specializing in remittances.

The second startup is Bits of Proof, based in Budapest. It has built an enterprise-grade server to integrate blockchain technology into financial applications. Támas Blummer, its founder and CEO, becomes DAH’s Chief Ledger Architect.

Blythe Masters, brought on as DAH’s CEO earlier this year, seemed to indicate that the moves were geared toward hiring blockchain talent, which is in tight supply these days. The acquisitions “add valuable new dimensions to our product offering and great talent to our team,” she said.