Telecom giant AT&T announced yesterday that it has begun accepting Bitcoin for bill payments. The company has partnered with bitcoin payments company BitPay to facilitate the transactions. According to Kevin McDorman, vice president, AT&T communications, AT&T already has customers who use cryptocurrency. “…we are happy we can offer them a way to pay their bills with the method they prefer,” he stated in a press release making the announcement. “AT&T was great to work with as they understood the need to offer bitcoin payments and were quick to implement it,” said Sonny Singh, chief commercial officer at BitPay.

BitPay, payment partner to AT&T, has had an interesting trajectory. Started in 2011, the company’s initial goal was to enable retail transactions using Bitcoin. But low mainstream adoption numbers for the cryptocurrency have delayed that goal. Meanwhile, Bitpay has pivoted towards becoming an international money transfer platform for small businesses. “We are a bridge between the cryptocurrency and fiat worlds,” said Rolf Haag, head of business solutions with BitPay. In 2017, the company processed transactions worth $1.3 billion in 2017 and set itself a goal of transacting money transfers worth $4 billion in 2018. According to Crunchbase, it has raised $72.5 million in over six rounds of funding.