Ryder raises US$3.2 million from Tim Draper, Solana’s Anatoly Yakovenko, and other investors to simplify and secure crypto storage.
Ryder, a Filipino-led tech startup founded by Louise Ivan Valencia Payawal, raised US$3.2 million in seed funding backed by renowned venture capitalist Tim Draper, founder of Draper Associates. The round also saw participation from Solana founder Anatoly Yakovenko, Asymmetric’s Joe McCann, and venture firms Borderless, Semantic, Smape, and VeryEarly.
Ryder’s flagship product, Ryder One, is a crypto hardware wallet designed to make securing and using digital assets more intuitive and accessible. Its signature feature, TapSafe, enables users to recover their wallets through a simple tap-based system, eliminating the need for traditional seed phrases that often pose a single point of failure in crypto storage.
“What the crypto industry needs more than anything right now is solutions that don’t require deep technical knowledge but still maintain strong security,” said Tim Draper, Founder of Draper Associates. “That’s what I saw in Ryder’s product.”
The new capital will be used to expand production, grow Ryder’s engineering and marketing teams, and strengthen its global brand presence. Payawal, originally from Bulacan, Philippines, began his entrepreneurial journey as Startup Weekend ASEAN’s 2015 champion before earning a double master’s degree in Green IT from the University of Amsterdam and Vrije Universiteit.
Prior to founding Ryder, Payawal worked with several international tech firms, including Stacks, a Bitcoin-based smart contract platform where he helped build a 100,000-strong global community. Through Ryder, he aims to make cryptocurrency adoption simpler and more inclusive for ordinary users, especially Filipinos new to the technology.
“Crypto should be for everyone, not just developers or early adopters,” said Louise Ivan Valencia Payawal, Founder and CEO of Ryder. “With the right tools, it can be as simple as sending a text.”
Payawal’s journey from small-town beginnings to global entrepreneurship highlights a broader vision of Filipino innovation on the world stage.
“We’re all big dreamers,” he added. “What sets Filipinos apart is resilience — the ability to keep moving forward even when the odds are stacked against us.”
With this latest funding, Ryder is positioned to bring its hardware wallet to a global audience while advancing its mission to make crypto security simple, human-centred, and accessible to all.
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