Coinbase: Why Did We Spend $400M to Acquire Echo?

Original Article Title: Coinbase acquires Echo: Unlocking the future of onchain capital formation
Original Article Authors: Shan Aggarwal, Aklil Ibssa
Translation: Peggy, BlockBeats

Editor's Note: Against the backdrop of on-chain financing gradually becoming a new trend in the crypto industry, Coinbase is accelerating the construction of its capital market infrastructure. On October 20, 2025, the U.S. crypto exchange Coinbase announced the completion of the acquisition of the on-chain financing platform Echo. This acquisition is not only a fusion of technology and philosophy but also a key step for Coinbase to venture into the "on-chain primary market." This article is translated from the Coinbase official blog and aims to help readers understand the strategic logic and industry significance behind this transaction.

The following is the original content:

Enabling More People to Participate in Early-Stage Investment in Next-Generation Innovation

Coinbase has officially acquired Echo—an on-chain platform dedicated to helping the community invest collectively and providing more equity management options for entrepreneurs. In line with our philosophy, Echo believes that early-stage investment should be democratized, allowing more people to support next-generation breakthrough innovation companies.

Echo was founded by Cobie, a crypto OG who has long advocated for "community-driven investment." Over the years, Echo has been building tools to make financing more inclusive, transparent, and efficient, driving innovation in on-chain fundraising methods.

Why do this? The answer is simple: we aim to build a more open, efficient, and transparent capital market. However, currently, entrepreneurs still face funding difficulties, and ordinary investors can hardly participate in private token sales.

Echo changes this. It allows projects to raise funds directly from the community—whether through private sales or through self-custodied public token sales via the Sonar platform. By integrating Echo's tools into the Coinbase ecosystem, we will enable more communities to directly participate in fundraising, achieving a seamless on-chain connection between projects and capital.

Currently, we will start with cryptocurrency token sales based on Sonar, but in the future, we also plan to expand into the realm of tokenized securities and real-world assets, fully leveraging Echo's infrastructure capabilities.

Since its launch, Echo has made significant progress in the private sale market—helping a variety of projects raise over $200 million in around 300 transactions.

Its latest launch, the self-hosted public token issuance product Sonar, has also seen initial success, providing technical support for Plasma's XPL token sale.

Through this acquisition, Coinbase is building a full-stack solution for crypto projects and investors, covering the entire cycle from project initiation and fundraising to secondary market trading.

For Builders: Easier access to capital and the ability to use fundraising tools aligned with community interests—such as Echo's private investment platform and Sonar's self-hosted public token sale solution.

For Investors: Access to new and diverse investment opportunities previously inaccessible through a trusted platform like Echo or through Sonar's direct issuance channel.

For the Onchain Economy: Building a more efficient, transparent, and globally accessible capital market to further drive innovation and growth.

Echo and our recently acquired Liquifi complement each other well. Liquifi enables early-stage teams to efficiently create tokens and manage equity, while Echo extends our support from the "startup phase" to the "fundraising phase."

Combined with our existing strengths in exchange listing, custody, staking, trading, and financing, Coinbase now has the capability to serve token issuers and investors throughout their entire lifecycle—from project inception and fundraising to secondary market circulation, all within one ecosystem.

Coinbase has always been a nexus of users, liquidity, and trust. This foray into fundraising is aimed at further breaking down ecosystem barriers, empowering builders and investors, and collectively driving the continued growth of the entire crypto ecosystem.

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