Thunes moves into US gaming payments with Tilia deal

Photo credit: Thunes

Singapore-headquartered Thunes, a cross-border payments specialist, is set to acquire Tilia, a US-based payments provider for online games, virtual worlds, and creator economies. The amount is undisclosed.

The deal would allow Thunes – which helps customers like Grab, Paypal, and Uber to send and accept payments across different countries – to expand its offerings to US merchants. They include Tilia’s customers, which use its platform to help convert gamers’ real money into in-game tokens, among other uses.

Tilia’s previous majority owner is Linden Lab, the developer behind the Second Life metaverse. Once the acquisition closes, Thunes will enter into a five-year exclusive partnership with Linden Lab to process the latter’s payments and payouts.

Once approved by regulators, Tilia will take on the Thunes brand but keep its San Francisco headquarters.

Based in Singapore, Thunes has regional offices in the city-state, London, Shanghai, Beijing, Dubai, Hong Kong, and Miami. Last July, the company hit US$900 million in valuation after raising an additional US$12 million from investors like Visa for its series C round.

Thunes said it has 4 billion bank accounts, 3 billion digital wallets, and 550 alternative payment methods connected to its network. It secured a French payments institution license last year.

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