AAA Square swipes $200m

Square swipes $200m

Visa-backed mobile payments company Square has confirmed that it has finally closed its series D round, amassing $200m from investors including coffee shop Starbucks, private equity investor Suhail Rizvi, and Citi Ventures.

The firm previously announced one tranche of the funding whilst simultaneously unveiling its partnership with Starbucks, which invested $25m in Twitter founder Jack Dorsey’s company.

The Calif.-based firm is now valued at $3.25bn after raising $341m in venture funding. In June 2011, the firm raised $100m in a series C round led by venture firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, which led to Square being valued at $1.6bn, the New York Times said. Other backers include venture firm Sequoia Capital, investment manager Tiger Global Management. The round was later extended to include a further $3m from chairman of the Virgin Group Richard Branson.

Square raised $27.5m for its series B round in January 2011 which was led by Sequoia Capital and backed by Visa. A series A round in 2009 led by Khosla Ventures with participation from numerous angel investors raised an additional $10m.

The latest financing is expected to be used to both spread Square’s payment service across the States, and to international locations. Starbucks’ chief operating officer Howard Schultz confirmed to news provider TechCrunch that the coffee retailer would be used as a platform to spread Square abroad.

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