# Sponge

*Infrastructure for AI agents to hold and spend money.*

Sponge is a San Francisco-based Y Combinator (W26) startup founded by ex-Stripe engineers. It provides financial infrastructure for AI agents via Sponge Wallet and Sponge Gateway, enabling agents to hold and spend money while letting businesses monetize API traffic. Operating across Tempo, Ethereum, Base, and Solana, the platform supports x402 and MPP, alongside fiat rails powered by Bridge.

## At a glance

- **Type:** payments app
- **Category:** payments-apps
- **Status:** active
- **Website:** https://sponge.money

## Key facts

- **Products:** Sponge Wallet for AI agent accounts and Sponge Gateway for businesses to sell directly to agents. _(confidence 95%)_
- **Headquarters:** San Francisco, California. _(confidence 93%)_
- **Company Status:** Founded in 2026 and participated in the Y Combinator Winter 2026 batch. _(confidence 95%)_
- **Founders:** Jae Choi, Eric Zhang, and Rishab Luthra (former Stripe engineers). _(confidence 95%)_
- **Supported Networks:** Ethereum, Base, Tempo, and Solana. _(confidence 90%)_
- **Payment Protocols:** Supports the x402 protocol and Machine Payments Protocol (MPP) for paid HTTP requests. _(confidence 91%)_

## Related entities

- [Machine Payments Protocol (MPP)](https://tempo.dataos.so/entity/machine-payments-protocol) — integrates

## Sources

1. [https://paysponge.com/](https://paysponge.com/)
2. [https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/sponge](https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/sponge)
3. [https://docs.paysponge.com/wallets-and-transfers](https://docs.paysponge.com/wallets-and-transfers)
4. [https://docs.paysponge.com/quickstart-payments](https://docs.paysponge.com/quickstart-payments)

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Last reviewed: 7 Jun 2025  
Canonical: https://tempo.dataos.so/entity/sponge  
Source: tempowiki (https://tempo.dataos.so) — an independent, sourced reference for the Tempo ecosystem. Not affiliated with Tempo, Stripe, or Paradigm.