How Skyrise Runs a Global Creative Agency on One Account That Takes Fiat and Stablecoins Alike

“At the end of the day it all lands together, in the same account, under one value. We don't need to worry about all these different sources and currencies coming in to manage it.”

Xico, Founder and CEO, Skyrise

From Solana to everywhere

Skyrise is a full-service creative agency with capabilities spanning branding and design, motion and animation, advertising, events, and production. It made its name in the Solana ecosystem, but the business it runs today reaches far beyond crypto.

Its clients span the US, Canada, Europe, and Asia, including many companies that have never touched crypto. That means the way Skyrise gets paid depends on who is on the other side. One client might send USDC over Solana. Another might send a US dollar wire without ever interacting with a stablecoin.

The same is true when money goes back out. Some team members are paid in USDC, while others need euros sent to local bank accounts. Contractors and vendors bring their own payment requirements.

To manage this complexity with ease, Skyrise needs access to stablecoins and traditional banking rails in one place, without stitching together two separate financial systems.

Altitude gave those different flows one place to meet. A client can pay by ACH or Fedwire while another sends USDC, and both payments land in the same operating account. From there, Skyrise can pay out through banking or stablecoin rails without moving money between separate systems first.

“It really allows us to just do everything in one place. That was a game changer.”

Xico, Founder and CEO, Skyrise

One global business, endless financial tools

That mix of clients and payment methods is only one part of the story. Skyrise has eight core team members and scales to around twenty for larger projects. Most of the team is in Portugal, with others in Thailand and the US. Productions add contractors, equipment rentals, local vendors, and other costs wherever the work happens.

As the people and projects spread out, the money does too. Funds come in from clients across three continents in both fiat and stablecoins, then go back out to the team, contractors, vendors, and production costs through both banking and stablecoin rails.

Before Altitude, each of those flows had its own place and process. Crypto sat in a Squads multisig or hot wallet. Paying someone in fiat meant off-ramping first, moving the money to another account, then sending it again. Domestic and European transfers lived in separate places. At the end of it all came the reconciliation nightmare.

For a team of eight, this was a lot of operational overhead just to keep the business moving.

With Altitude, treasury, incoming payments, outgoing payments, and cards were all consolidated into one operating account. This means no more juggling tools. Everything sits in one clean ledger connected to its accounting software. Skyrise can still receive and send money in different ways, but the team no longer has to maintain a separate financial process for each workflow.

Great work gets messy behind the scenes

Bringing everything into one place solved the fragmentation, but managing agency spend was another challenge. Different teams worked across different projects and places, with expenses happening wherever the work did.

Skyrise regularly flies team members out for shoots and events, where travel, equipment, vendors, and other production costs can come up quickly. Previously, employees often covered those expenses themselves and got reimbursed afterward, leaving Skyrise to verify, organize, and reconcile everything after the fact.

With Altitude, Skyrise can organize spend before it happens. The team can issue unlimited corporate cards for different teams, projects, or types of spend, each with its own budget and controls. Team members have what they need to get the work done, while Skyrise keeps spend organized from the start.

That gives Skyrise more control over spend, with the added benefit of getting cashback on purchases.

One place to run a global business

For Skyrise, Altitude brought the financial side of the business together in one place built for global operations. Stablecoins and banking rails, money coming in and going out, and team spend can all be managed together instead of across separate systems.

That matters for a business where clients, teams, and projects cross borders and every project can bring a different set of financial needs. Skyrise can operate the way it needs to without creating more work for the team behind the scenes.

Just as important is having support when something does come up. Skyrise stays in close contact with the Altitude team through a shared chat for account questions, edge cases, and product requests. Xico says answers often come within the hour, and some of the changes Skyrise has asked for have made their way into the product.

“Any issue we have, we have an answer, and it's pretty much resolved within the hour. That's something you don't find in a more traditional, more detached solution.”

Xico, Founder and CEO, Skyrise

What this means for creative agencies

Creative agencies are global by nature. Clients, teams, vendors, and productions rarely operate in one place or one financial system. Altitude gives agencies one place to manage that complexity without changing how the people they work with prefer to pay, get paid, or spend.

TLDR

• Skyrise runs an eight-person core team across Portugal, Thailand, and the US, scaling to around twenty people for larger projects.
• Its clients span America, Europe, and Asia and pay in both fiat and stablecoins.
• Before Altitude, crypto treasury, fiat payments, domestic transfers, and European transfers lived across different tools and accounts.
• With Altitude, USDC and fiat payments can land in the same operating account, while Skyrise pays team members and vendors through the rails they prefer.
• Altitude cards give traveling team members company budgets and spending limits instead of requiring them to front production expenses personally.
• For Skyrise, the value is not choosing between banking rails and stablecoin rails. It is being able to use both without running two separate financial systems.