# Sean Neville

> Sean Neville is the cofounder and CEO of Catena Labs, a Boston startup building what it calls the first fully regulated AI-native financial institution - a bank designed for autonomous AI agents to hold accounts, spend, get paid, and settle in stablecoins. He previously cofounded Circle in 2013 with Jeremy Allaire and served as its president and co-CEO, where he was the architect behind USDC. Catena raised an $18 million seed in May 2025 (led by a16z crypto) and a $30 million Series A in May 2026 (led by Acrew Capital and a16z crypto), and is applying for a national trust bank charter with the OCC.

- **Role:** Cofounder & CEO at Catena Labs
- **Organizations:** Catena Labs, Circle Internet Financial, Sevenchord, Brightcove, Adobe, Macromedia, Allaire, Code Studio
- **Nationality:** American
- **Known for:** Architect of USDC, the second-largest stablecoin, which has settled hundreds of billions in transaction volume, Cofounder of Circle Internet Financial (2013), which IPO'd in 2025 with a 450% surge, Author and steward of the open source Agent Commerce Kit (ACK) protocol for AI agent identity and payments

## Career timeline

- **1998** — Founded Code Studio, building enterprise software for finance, media, and startups
- **2000** — Joined Allaire as senior software engineer
- **2001** — Senior architect and principal scientist at Macromedia (later Adobe)
- **2006** — Senior software architect at Brightcove
- **2008** — Founded Sevenchord, a mobile app development studio
- **2013** — Cofounded Circle with Jeremy Allaire; served as president and later co-CEO
- **2018** — Circle launches USDC, the stablecoin Neville architected
- **2019** — Stepped down as co-CEO of Circle in December; remained on the board
- **2022** — Cofounded Catena Labs
- **2025-05** — Catena Labs emerges from stealth with $18M seed led by a16z crypto
- **2026-05** — Catena Labs raises $30M Series A led by Acrew Capital and a16z crypto

## Achievements

- Architect of USDC, the second-largest stablecoin, which has settled hundreds of billions in transaction volume
- Cofounder of Circle Internet Financial (2013), which IPO'd in 2025 with a 450% surge
- Author and steward of the open source Agent Commerce Kit (ACK) protocol for AI agent identity and payments
- Raised $48M across seed and Series A rounds for Catena Labs from a16z crypto, Breyer Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Circle Ventures, Acrew Capital, and others
- Filed application for a national trust bank charter with the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency

## Latest updates

- **2026-05** — Catena Labs closed a $30M Series A led by Acrew Capital and a16z crypto
- **2025-10** — Neville keynoted Money20/20 in Las Vegas on stablecoins and AI
- **2025-05** — Catena Labs came out of stealth with $18M in seed funding

## Links

- Website: https://catena.com
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/seanneville
- Twitter/X: https://twitter.com/psneville

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Profile page: https://yespress.io/sean-neville
Published by YesPress — https://yespress.io
Last updated: 2026-07-08