ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) — Bitcoin has been on the rise for the past few years and now a Bitcoin mining company is headquartered right here in Rochester.
Local company Foundry is investing in Bitcoin and in the city of Rochester. CEO Mike Colyer said Bitcoin is here to stay.
Colyer has been in the business for a few years. He said Bitcoin comes from blockchain technology which allows people to transfer value electronically through the internet.
“So Bitcoin mining is basically the computers that run the network and they do two things they secure the network and they process the transactions and that’s done in a decentralized way so anybody in the world can participate in the network,” said Colyer.
He said one big benefit to participating in Bitcoin mining is getting paid for doing it.
“I think the easiest analogy is you go to the store and you swipe your credit card, Visa, Master Card, they take a couple percent of every transaction and it goes to one company, where if you’re processing mining you get to participate in that network and you get some of those transaction fees.”
Foundry is looking to invest over $100 million into the mining system in North America. It’s owned by a larger company in New York City and they’re expanding it here in the Flower City.
“We picked Rochester, one of the reasons is because of the tech talent here. We’ve got amazing universities, we’ve got amazing talent and it’s a great place to live so it’s like, ‘why not build a business here in Rochester?’” Coyler said.
He also said they’re looking to hire more software developers and encourages anyone interested to apply. They hope to add more than 20 jobs here over 12 to 18 months.