Cryptographic ledger systems startup Chain Inc. has been acquired by Lightyear Corp., the commercial arm of the Stellar Development Foundation, the organization behind the Lumens cryptocurrency.

The price of the acquisition was not disclosed, Forbes claimed Monday that it was the equivalent of $500 million paid in Lumens.

Founded in 2014, Chain builds cryptographic ledger systems that are said to make financial services smarter, more secure and more connected. The company’s Sequence platform is a cloud blockchain infrastructure that allows organizations to build financial services from the ground up and securely manage their financial assets in a token format on private ledgers.

The company has found a willing audience and counts among its customers Visa Inc., Nasdaq Inc., Citigroup Inc. and State Street Corp. Chain had raised $43.7 million, according to Crunchbase, including a $30 million round in 2015. Citi, Visa and Nasdaq are also investors.

Chain’s blockchain platform will be merged into Lightyear to become Interstellar with the combined entity focused on creating tools, products and services to make it easier to use and build on the Stellar platform, especially for enterprises and institutions.

“The merger brings Chain’s enterprise products and customer base to Stellar’s global public ledger, creating an end-to-end solution that will enable organizations to issue, exchange, and manage assets on a highly-scalable public network,” a statement published on Medium stated. “Chain’s cloud ledger service, Sequence, will allow organizations to easily track assets as they move between private ledgers and the Stellar network.”

With the acquisition, Adam Ludwin, who is currently Chain’s chief executive officer, will be Interstellar’s CEO while Jed McCaleb, co-founder of the Stellar Development Foundation and Lightyear, will be chief technology officer of the combined entity.

The deal is significant because it’s possibly the largest acquisition in the burgeoning financial tech blockchain market to date. There is no shortage of companies trying to bring their own blockchain products to market in the space and although the market potential is huge, it’s also finite.

Chain combined with Lightyear/Stellar sees two platforms with an already substantial customer base become a bigger company again, a possible sign that the fintech blockchain market is ripe for consolidation.

Image: Chain