Silicon Valley venture capitalist Marc Andreessen has been appointed to the board of directors at the leading crypto exchange Coinbase.
Coming amid reports that the crypto giant is preparing to go public, the appointment of Marc Andreessen to the Coinbase Board was announced by CEO and co-founder Benjamin Armstrong.
“As Coinbase continues on its path to growing the cryptoeconomy and creating an open financial system for the world, we’ll look to leaders and experts from a range of fields to help guide us. Of primary importance is our Board of Directors. We look to our Board members and Observers to draw from their areas of expertise to counsel us on everything from product development to world-class governance practices.”
Andreessen was an early advocate for cryptocurrency and been a long-standing advisor to some of Silicon Valley’s most successful executives as co-founder of the premier and pioneering VC firm Andreessen Horowitz.
Considered one of the crypto industry’s largest investment backers, Andreessen Horowitz raised $25 million to expand Coinbase’s Bitcoin wallet and merchant services in 2013. In March of this year, the firm secured $515 million to invest in crypto technologies.
“An innovator and creator, he is one of the few to pioneer a software category used by more than a billion people and one of even fewer to establish multiple billion-dollar companies. Marc co-created the highly influential Mosaic internet browser and co-founded Netscape. He also co-founded Loudcloud, which as Opsware, sold to Hewlett-Packard for $1.6 billion. He later served on the Board of Hewlett-Packard from 2008 to 2018.”
Welcomed to the Coinbase Boardroom alongside Marc Andreessen after a board reshuffle that saw Chris Dixon and Barry Schuler stepping down, is Google veteran and Doordash executive Gokul Rajaram.
“Both [Andreessen and Rajaram] bring a wealth of experience that we’ll put to use to the benefit of the company, our customers and the broader community.”
Coinbase was last valued at $8 billion.