Global cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase, unveils the Ethereum L2 network “Base” that is secure, low-cost, and developer-friendly with an aim to make on-chain the next online and onboard over 1 billion users into the cryptoeconomy.
According to the announcement, “Base makes it easy to build decentralized apps with access to Coinbase’s products, users, and tools.”
To celebrate the testnet debut, interested community members may mint ‘Base, Introduced‘ NFT for free till Sunday on the Zora NFT marketplace. There were 82,804 Base NFTs minted at the time of writing.
Base was created by Coinbase to offer quick, safe access to the Ethereum L1, other L2s, and other L1 ecosystems like Solana.
Base is built on the MIT-licensed OP Stack in partnership with the layer-2 blockchain Optimism.
The cryptocurrency exchange also unveiled the Base Ecosystem Fund, which will make investments in and provides assistance for Base-based early-stage startups that satisfy Coinbase’s investment requirements.
Approved participants will receive exclusive access to new Base features as well as direct support from the core developer and BD team members in the exclusive Base developer Discord.
A representative for Coinbase said that several crypto firms, including Blockdaemon, Chainlink, Etherscan, Quicknode, Aave, Animoca Brands, Dune, Nansen, Magic Eden, etc., have committed to building on Base.
“Our focus is ensuring a successful testnet. In the weeks ahead, we’ll share our roadmap to mainnet and provide more developers resources for building on Base,” Coinbase revealed.
Coinbase Senior Director of Engineering Jesse Pollak stated “This is a bet that we can help enable the next million dapps, which are going to bring in the next billion users. We think that’s going to happen on a five- to 10-year horizon and this is our contribution to making that happen sooner rather than later. Our goal is to launch mainnet in the next few months.”
Currently, Coinbase does not plan to issue a new network token for Base and will use Ethereum (ETH) as the native gas token.
Pollak noted “We’ve seen a lot of people kind of use tokens to drive activity. But our thesis is that tokens are not the only way to drive activity. Building great products is a great way of driving activity by making things actually useful.”
According to Coinbase, it is steadfastly committed to Base’s decentralization in the years to come. The exchange is certain that Base will advance from a Stage 0 rollup to a Stage 1 rollup in 2023 and a Stage 2 rollup in 2024.
