COINBASE buys a competitor

In an effort to strengthen its position in the cryptocurrency space, popular cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase on April 13 announced the acquisition of Cipher Browser, a free Ethereum mobile wallet, and a web3 browser dapp that is similar to its own Toshi product.

Introduced last year, Toshi is a free application programming interface for bitcoin application developers that runs on a bitcoin node backed by an SQL database. Toshi users can also use the platform as a wallet for Ethereum coin and to send secure messages. The Cipher product has essentially the same functionality, so the company's move could be seen as a strategic acquisition to eliminate competition.

Coinbase plans to combine the teams of both products and appoint Cipher Browser creator Pete Kim to lead the combined product, which will retain the Toshi name.

Rachel Horwitz, Coinbase's vice president of communications, explained in a statement: "Coinbase is committed to acquiring the best teams and technology in crypto space. Given the similarities between our products, we are excited to join Pete as head of engineering at Toshi, along with Sid Coelho-Prabhu, former exec. We will be integrating some of Cipher's functionality into Toshi in the near future." 

The same day, Pete Kim tweeted that adding test cases would be one of the first features coming to Toshi's product.

As part of its strategy to expand the crypto market, Coinbase last month hired former LinkedIn executive Amelia Choi as vice president of corporate development and business expansion. This month, the platform announced that it plans to add support for new Bitcoin hard forks. This support is expected to only apply to withdrawals. In addition, the company will create a fund to finance cryptocurrency and blockchain startups, which will be called Coinbase Ventures.

In addition, Coinbase has filed an application with the US Securities and Exchange Commission to registration as an official licensed broker.

According to https://bitcoinist.com