Bitcoin rewards company Lolli has announced a raise of $5 million for its pre-Series A funding round from a slew of notable investors, including tennis superstar Serena Williams.

Both Lolli and Williams share common interests in financial empowerment and inclusion, which are the main reasons why the bitcoin rewards platform was able to garner support from her and her team.

“I’m excited to announce my investment in Lolli, a company on a mission to make bitcoin more accessible,” Williams said in a statement. “Earning and owning bitcoin is a step towards financial inclusivity for all people.”

Along with Williams’ investment company Serena Ventures, the round also features her husband Alexis Ohanian’s management company Seven Seven Six and Night Media, as well as other influential investors such as Casey Neistat, Phil DeFranco, Cody Ko, Noel Miller, Ian Borthwick and Gabriel Leydon, Coindesk reports.

Last year, Lolli attracted participation from popular figures Michelle Phan and Ashton Kutcher, and Digital Currency Group (CoinDesk’s owner), proving to be a viable investment opportunity to the industry’s movers and shakers.

As cryptocurrency is seeing a huge boom this year, bitcoin is right on its tail with companies like Lolli offering more resources for shoppers and consumers.

Lolli — which launched in 2018 — is a rewards application that gives consumers bitcoin to shop at their partner stores. Since launching, the unique incentive has boasted over 1,000 merchants and 250,000 users through its platform, according to Coindesk.

In an interview with Coindesk, Lolli co-founder Alex Adelman shares that the company is currently offering an average of 7% bitcoin-back rewards with retailers such as Kroger, Microsoft, Booking.com and Ulta.

To date, he claims Lolli users have earned more than $3 million through their bitcoin rewards.

“We started out with the idea of educating people about bitcoin,” Adelman says. “So we just attached it to something that everybody does: shop. People think about investing when they think about bitcoin, but there’s probably less than 1% of the world that would consider themselves investors. Everybody would consider themselves a shopper.”

Adelman also reports that as bitcoin is reaching an all-time high, this only boosts the app’s stacking sats.

“They say for a technology to be transformative, you need to be 10 times better than the predecessor,” he shares with Coindesk. “Since we launched, bitcoin has gone up by 11 or 12 times, so 10 times better than any cashback program out there.”

With the financial-backing of investors like Williams and Ohanian, Lolli is set to be a change-maker in the crypto world.

For more information about Lolli, visit its website.

Lolli

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