Utexo raises $7.5 million to launch Bitcoin-based USDT payment infrastructure
Utexo, a startup building a Bitcoin-based stablecoin payment infrastructure, announced a $7.5 million seed round co-led by Tether, Big Brain Holdings, and Portal Ventures.
The round also included participation from strategic angels, including Franklin Templeton, Maven11 Capital, Fulgur Ventures, Alchemy VC, Ethereal Ventures, Auros Ventures, Arcanum Capital, Paper Ventures, Axia8, FlowTraders, Plan B, Gate Ventures, Sats Ventures, and operators of Ledger, Hyperion, BTC Turk, Echo, Legion, and SOLV.
The company was founded to address long-standing gaps in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. This means enabling USDT to natively anchor itself to Bitcoin via a robust, production-ready payment rail. tethers
CEO Paolo Ardoino said Bitcoin was central to the stablecoin issuer’s long-term vision for USDT. “Market cycles come and go, but the need for open and resilient payments infrastructure remains constant,” Ardoino said.
He added that Utexo provides a layer that makes Bitcoin-based USDT payments viable at scale, strengthening Bitcoin’s role as a global payment rail for real dollar transactions.
Historically, the Lightning Network and RGB protocol provided the technical capabilities for Bitcoin-based payments, but their complexity limited their adoption in production environments. Utexo abstracts this complexity behind a single API layer, allowing payment operators to route USDT payments over Bitcoin-based rails without modifying custody, compliance workflows, or user experience.
Utexo co-founder Chris Hutchinson explained the system’s value proposition: “We built Utexo to allow USDT to move out of Bitcoin the way money moves, instantly, privately, and without unexpected changes to costs. Once our partners integrate our APIs, they can route USDT on the most resilient open network ever built, while maintaining full control of their cost structure.”
Co-founder Viktor Ihnatiuk added that the infrastructure will allow the wallet to offer free USDT transactions while also driving adoption of Bitcoin-based stablecoins.
The infrastructure supports atomic payments, privacy-preserving execution, and predictable fees for all transactions, regardless of network congestion.
Payments are made in USDT and are pegged to Bitcoin’s security model, completing in less than a second. Utexo encrypts all on-chain transactions, preventing disclosure of counterparty and wallet addresses and distinguishing them from public transaction graphs on other networks.
Tether and Bitcoin
By providing a reliable and predictable payments layer, the company advances Tether’s vision of Bitcoin’s native USDT by enabling Bitcoin to serve as a viable rail for dollar-denominated payments.
Last February, Tether open source MiningOS (MOS), a modular operating system for managing and automating Bitcoin mining operations, was unveiled at the 2026 Plan ₿ Forum in San Salvador.
The system uses a peer-to-peer architecture to provide integrated control of hardware, energy, and site infrastructure, reducing reliance on proprietary or centralized software.
Targeted at exchanges, wallets, payment service providers, high-frequency trading firms, and platforms handling large amounts of USDT, Utexo focuses on routing existing stablecoin flows through Bitcoin rather than launching speculative L2 solutions.
