Coinbase acquires Cobie’s crypto fundraising platform Echo for $375M

1/ Key takeaways

Coinbase acquired Echo, the onchain capital formation platform founded by crypto investor Cobie, for about $375 million to build compliant, blockchain-native fundraising infrastructure. This deal will keep Echo a standalone platform while Coinbase integrates its public sale product, Sonar, to expand access to onchain capital formation for both founders and investors.

2/ Coinbase acquires Cobie’s crypto fundraising platform Echo for $375M

Coinbase has acquired Echo, the onchain capital formation platform founded by crypto investor Cobie, for approximately $375 million.

The move underscores the exchange giant’s push to build compliant, blockchain-native fundraising infrastructure as onchain capital markets mature, according to Coinbase’s announcement.

Cobie reflected on the sale in a post, writing: “When I started building Echo two years ago, I knew it had a 95% chance of failing. To be honest, I couldn’t really imagine any other outcome, but I thought at least it may be a noble failure worth attempting.

“I certainly didn’t think Echo would be sold to Coinbase, but, here we are,” he added.

Echo will remain a standalone platform under its existing brand while Coinbase integrates Sonar, Echo’s public sale product, into its ecosystem. The companies plan to expand access for founders and investors to onchain capital formation directly through Coinbase’s interface.

On Monday, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong revealed that the company also purchased Cobie’s original UpOnly NFT — the emblem of Cobie’s long-running crypto podcast — for $25 million, calling it “a piece of crypto culture worth preserving” in a tweet. The NFT will reportedly be displayed in Coinbase’s onchain heritage collection, though financial details have not been independently verified.

Coinbase has made a handful of acquisitions so far this year. The exchange bought Deribit in a multi-billion dollar deal to expand into global derivatives trading. It also acquired the Opyn leadership team in July to strengthen its onchain markets stack, and acquired the founders of Sensible in September to develop consumer-friendly DeFi tools.

3/ Hola Tech’s pov:

This significant acquisition of Echo by Coinbase for $375 million is a major signal for the future of onchain capital formation that tech lovers, especially those in Web3 and DeFi, should closely watch. The move indicates Coinbase’s commitment to building a compliant, institutional-grade infrastructure for founders and investors to raise capital directly on the blockchain, suggesting a maturing and mainstreaming of decentralized fundraising.

Tech enthusiasts should anticipate a more seamless integration of sophisticated onchain market tools like Echo’s Sonar product directly into the widely-used Coinbase interface, potentially lowering the barrier to entry for both participation and compliance in token sales and other onchain capital events. Furthermore, the accompanying $25 million purchase of Cobie’s UpOnly NFT highlights the increasing recognition and valuation of “crypto culture” and digital heritage by major corporate entities, setting a precedent for how significant digital assets might be preserved and displayed in the future.

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