Payments startup Stripe is powering the donations systems behind many of the presidential campaigns for 2016, including Hillary Clinton, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Jeb Bush, the DNC and the RNC, according to Stripe’s co-founders.
Speaking onstage at Fortune’s Brainstorm Tech conference in Aspen, Stripe’s co-founders (and brothers) Patrick and John Collision explained how their payments system landed the candidates in an election that’s expected to bring in $5 billion in campaign donations.
“[Presidential campaigns] are basically a form of startup,” Patrick said in explaining the importance of flexibility and creating an easy and reliable way for customers (or donors) to fork over their money. “They can’t afford to miss a beat or be behind for a month.”
He noted that all of the campaigns want to build a “best in class architecture” in the next year and a half, “and then it will evaporate” after the elections are over. Underscoring the importance of agility, he noted that “the world will change” in that time, with new devices and new mobile payments systems. “When you care about speed of development over the next few months, that’s what really resonated with [the campaigns],” he said.
Stripe, which is rumored to be raising new funding at a valuation of $5 billion, has no immediate plans to go public, the founders said.