Lamassu Bitcoin ATM Available For Pre-Order As Preliminary Production Kicks Off

On July 1, we got our first look at Lamassu's Bitcoin ATM, a smaller-than-your-average ATM machine that supports more than 200 local currencies and brings the realities of virtual money into your everyday life. Now the ATM is available for pre-order on the company's website, with Lamassu kicking off production with a preliminary round of 15 units.

Officially called the Bitcoin Machine, the ATM pre-order announcement was made in a newsletter fired off on Monday of this week. According to a press release it has now made available, that initial announcement led to enough pre-orders to fund the preliminary round of units. In case you were wondering, yes the pre-orders took place in Bitcoin, and for the equivalent of $5,000 USD.

The preliminary production run, as we mentioned, is expected to be 15 units that will ship out to buyers some time in September. The rest of the pre-orders, then, are currently slated for shipping by the end of the year, though when that will take place isn't explicitly stated. According to Lamassu, the company has received more than 150 inquiries about the ATM.

The ATM works by having the user scan a QR code that is linked to a Bitcoin account. From there, the user then inserts his or her local currency and has it transformed into Bitcoin. There is no minimum deposit amount for using the machine, something that the company feels will help encourage the curious to try out the ATM.

Said Lamassu's CEO Zach Harvey: "We feel the urgency to get our machines out there. Obtaining Bitcoin is just as hard now as it was when we set out to develop the Bitcoin Machine, and this is a solution we feel a lot of people have been waiting for. I believe the excitement revolving around our machine stems from a few of its basic advantages over other methods of obtaining Bitcoin. Those advantages are ease of use, zero registration, walk-in conversion and no minimum deposit."

SOURCE: Engadget