Ledger doubles down with second touchscreen-focused product

Crypto firm Ledger unveiled a new security offering during this year’s Bitcoin Conference, continuing the company’s product lineup refresh in 2024.

Called Ledger Flex, the hardware wallet — featuring a touchscreen — is the Paris-based company’s second new product of the year. It introduced Ledger Stax earlier this year.

“Ledger devices already secure more than 20% of the world’s digital assets, and our new secure touchscreen category will make self-custody more accessible than ever before for more consumers and enterprises,” Ledger CEO Pascal Gauthier said in a statement.

Founded in 2014, Ledger has sold roughly six million devices over those 10 years. Its Stax product was designed by Tony Fadell, a tech executive known for being instrumental in overseeing the iPod’s development.

The differentiation of these new offerings lies in touchscreens that offer proof-of-humanity and proof-of-identity features, the company noted Friday. Such features can help guard against a blurring of reality and fiction accelerated by the growth of AI, according to Ledger.

A new app for the Flex and Stax products — called Ledger Security Key — offers two-factor authentication and passkey capabilities.

Gauthier noted in a May blog that the company had begun shipping Ledger Stax devices. Ledger Flex is set to start shipping to customers immediately. The “first-of-its-kind display” on the Stax was more difficult to bring to mass production than anticipated, Ledger’s CEO added in May.

“Within the next few years, the crypto revolution will reshape how hundreds of millions of people own and manage all value,” the CEO noted at the time. “But as I’ve said on multiple occasions, our smartphones and laptops lack fundamental security features to let us onboard this era.”

The product launches come after Ledger endured a “supply chain attack” on its ConnectKit in December. The phishing attack on a former ledger employee was “an unfortunate isolated incident,” Gauthier said. Ledger had pledged to make victims whole.

Start your day with top crypto insights from David Canellis and Katherine Ross. Subscribe to the Empire newsletter.

Explore the growing intersection between crypto, macroeconomics, policy and finance with Ben Strack, Casey Wagner and Felix Jauvin. Subscribe to the Forward Guidance newsletter.

Get alpha directly in your inbox with the 0xResearch newsletter — market highlights, charts, degen trade ideas, governance updates, and more.

The Lightspeed newsletter is all things Solana, in your inbox, every day. Subscribe to daily Solana news from Jack Kubinec and Jeff Albus.