Stripe, the online payments firm founded by Irish brothers Patrick and John Collison, is to create at least 1,000 new jobs here over the next five years.

The announcement came as Stripe raised $600m in fresh funding that will be invested into its European operations, particularly its Dublin office, as well as its global payments and treasury network.

The fundraising valued Stripe at $95bn, more than two and a half times what it was valued this time last year when it raised $600m at a valuation of $36bn.

"We're investing a ton more in Europe this year, particularly in Ireland," said John Collison, President and co-founder of Stripe. 

"Ireland is now a leading tech capital of Europe, with great talent and companies emerging all the time, we're keen to help cement that position".

Among those who have contributed to the fresh funding round are the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund managed by the National Treasury Management Agency (NTMA), which will invest $50m.

"Stripe is an accelerator of global economic growth and a leader in sustainable finance. We are convinced that, despite making great progress over the last 10 years, most of Stripe’s success is yet to come," said Conor O'Kelly, CEO of NTMA. 

"We’re delighted to back Ireland’s and Europe’s most prominent success story, and, in doing so, to help millions of other ambitious companies become more competitive in the global economy".

Allianz X, Axa, Baillie Gifford, Fidelity Management and Sequoia Capital will also all contribute to the fundraising round.

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The new roles in Dublin will be across a variety of teams, the company said, including engineering.

Stripe already employs around 300 staff in Dublin, which acts as its international headquarters, and 3,000 globally in 14 offices, with operations in 43 countries.

Dublin is Stripe's fastest-growing international office and is home to a broad range of functions.

The company’s payment technology is used by a large number of Irish firms, including Intercom, LetsGetChecked and DoneDeal.

"This is fantastic news on the jobs front and the start of a really welcome partnership between the Irish state and Stripe," said Tánaiste and Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, Leo Varadkar

"Over 1,000 new jobs will be created over the next 5 years. These are really good, well-paid, professional jobs and will be a real boost to the economy."

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Founded in 2010 by brothers Patrick and John Collison and launched a year later, the company counts big names like Amazon, Google, Facebook, Deliveroo, Salesforce and Shopify among its users.

The San Francisco based firm does not release revenue data, but says it processes hundreds of billions of dollars of transactions for millions of companies each year.

Last year it processed more commerce online than the entire value of the internet economy a decade ago when it was founded.

It recently added Mark Carney, the former Governor of the Bank of England, to its board.

The chief executive of IDA Ireland, Martin Shanahan, has described the announcement of 1,000 new jobs at online payments firm Stripe as "absolutely great" for Ireland.  

Speaking on RTÉ's News At One, Mr Shanahan said it sends out at "phenomenal signal from Ireland and about Ireland".  

He said it is his understanding that Stripe's Irish operations are going to be a "microcosm" of its global operations.  

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"This is global news", Mr Shanahan said. 

"It really couldn't be a better backdrop against which we enter into St Patrick's week, which we use to tell the Irish story about what is happening from an investment perspective," he said. 

Mr Shanahan said "no definitive decision" has yet been made on the location of the jobs and that the company and the IDA are working against the backdrop of a global pandemic.

He said he is confident the roles will all be filled due to the growth in the technology sector here in recent in years.

Liam Tutty, Founder of the Dead Centre Brewing in Athlone

200,000 new companies across Europe have signed up to Stripe since the pandemic began as more businesses move online including the Dead Centre Brewing in Athlone.

The business comprises of a pub, restaurant and brewery situated alongside the River Shannon.

Founder, Liam Tutty, said the pub and restaurant side of the businesses took a massive hit with the onset of the pandemic.

"We lost a lot of our routes to market so we started to sell our beer online through beercloud.ie but its really grown legs and its' keeping us very busy at the moment," he said.

Mr Tutty said they had a different payment method initially when selling things like take-away but he said it was a little tedious so they moved to Stripe, which more people were familiar with.

He said "from the front end it's very simple for the user to use and that was what we were hoping to achieve".

"It's a little widget that sits on the website and as soon as you're ready to pay it's ready to take your details," he added.

Liam Tutty said moving the business online has kept a lot of his staff employed.

Additional reporting by Dyane Connor