Kraken Appoints Former StockX Executive Vishnu Patankar as CTO

SAN FRANCISCO--Kraken, one of the world's longest standing and most trusted crypto platforms, today announced the appointment of Vishnu Patankar as Chief Technology Officer (CTO). Patankar brings more than twenty years of technology expertise to Kraken and has helped Fortune 500 companies like Microsoft, Amazon, Intel and Groupon scale products impacting millions of clients worldwide.

At Kraken, he will lead the engineering team and work with the company’s leadership to deliver the next generation of products and services. His focus will be on scaling the company into the most promising areas of crypto while maintaining its security-focused and client-obsessed ethos.

"Vishnu is a true leader in his field. He is a seasoned executive with deep expertise across all aspects of product development and tech leadership,” said Dave Ripley, CEO of Kraken. “He has built and led large, globally distributed engineering teams at some of the most innovative companies. He's a strategic and technical leader who is well equipped to build and optimize Kraken’s technology to deliver the most secure and scalable product experiences. We're thrilled to have him join our team."

An engineering leader with strong business acumen, Patankar helped build early scalable decentralized technologies by driving the development of products and infrastructure to service millions of clients around the world. Before joining Kraken, he was CTO at StockX where he played an integral part in facilitating the company's growth and launching its NFT offering.

"I'm excited to join Kraken and help propel the company's mission and vision forward," said Patankar. "Kraken is an authentic brand with a strong focus on its mission and client trust. I see the opportunity to bring the company's track record of continuous innovation to the next level, while ensuring we can successfully scale the company's technology to onboard the next 100 million consumers into crypto. I look forward to being part of this journey."

To learn more, please visit Kraken’s blog.

Kraken is one of the world’s longest-standing digital asset platforms. Globally, Kraken clients trade more than 200 digital assets and 8 different national currencies, including GBP, EUR, USD, CAD, JPY, CHF, AUD and AED.

Kraken, over 2,000 strong, was founded in 2011 and was one of the first exchanges to offer spot trading with margin, parachain auctions, staking, regulated derivatives and index services. In 2022, it launched a custodial NFT marketplace. Kraken is trusted by over 9 million traders and institutions around the world and offers professional, round-the-clock online support. Kraken was the first company to have ever conducted a Proof of Reserves audit and has since committed to undergoing Proof of Reserves on a semiannual basis.

Kraken is backed by investors including Tribe Capital, SkyBridge, Hummingbird Ventures, Blockchain Capital, Digital Currency Group, among others.

Kraken markets can be monitored and traded through the Kraken iOS and Android apps, and through the Cryptowatch iOS, Android and Desktop apps.

For more information about Kraken, please visit www.kraken.com.

 

Media inquiries: [email protected]

Staying true to our mission to bring crypto to everyone, Kraken Co-founder & Chairman of the Board Jesse Powell explains it all in our new video series: Crypto 101.

Recognizing the importance of Bitcoin from the onset, and understanding that the exchange is the most critical part of the cryptocurrency ecosystem, Jesse Powell co-founded Kraken to give people the means to quickly and securely invest in the space.