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In an effort to broaden its appeal and reach, Coinbase has just opened a new office in Dublin. The move is part of the firm’s contingency plan in case the Brexit deal goes sour in the United Kingdom.
Founded in 2012, Coinbase has had its European office in London for some time now, serving as the hub for its European customers. The new office in Dublin ensures that they will always have access to Europe as a bloc, even post-Brexit.
Mainland Europe
Zeeshan Feroz, the CEO of Coinbase U.K., told CNBC news that “the EU is our most significant market outside the U.S.” There is no doubt that Ireland has recently become a hotspot, not just for Coinbase, but for the many banks and their related firms who are moving en masse out of London due to Brexit. Many companies, like Coinbase, are expanding to new European offices to offset the impact of Brexit.
Feroz said that “[Brexit] definitely played some part in the decision,” but also considered was the fact that Ireland was already an existing good fit for the firm: an English-speaking country that provides Coinbase with entry into European markets.
With the opening of their new operations and offices in Dublin, Coinbase will now have its third office outside of the United States: London, Tokyo, and now Dublin.
As per Coinbase’s announcement, Ireland’s Minister for Financial Services and Insurance Michael D’Arcy T.D. has said: “I am delighted that Coinbase is opening an office in Dublin. His decision highlights the competitive offering and attractiveness of Ireland for financial services…”
Currently, Coinbase is offering a handful of positions for its new location in Dublin. These include the positions of Support Analyst, Compliance Manager, and Sr. Product Manager, among others.
An Expanding Staff
Coinbase is definitely trying to position itself as one of the future “too big to fail” cryptocurrency firms. The expansion to Dublin comes at a time when, just recently, Coinbase announced that they were able to double their staff while also hitting their 2018 hiring target.
Another recent expansion at Coinbase has been the additions to the managerial board of Coinbase. For example, Chris Dodds recently joined the Coinbase Board after working on the Board of Directors from Charles Schwab Corp, an investment firm.
Much of the staff expansion this year has been due to the flak the exchange has received since 2017 over their poor customer service. It was reported that users of the exchange filed a total of 134 pages of complaints to the American Securities and Exchange Commission. The conclusion the public came to was that Coinbase was ill-prepared for the explosive growth they experienced in the past few years. Coinbase Chief Executive Brian Armstrong said in August that the company was growing by some 50,000 customers per day on average in 2017.
The San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange is also in the process of getting their new office in Portland, Oregon up and running as well. Clearly being a response to the criticisms that Coinbase was not doing enough with customer service, the Portland location will mainly be set up for customer service. As per the announcement:
“Our new Portland office will host a variety of business-related functions. We’re hiring right now for roles focused on customer support, finance, compliance, IT and HR, and we expect to add up to 100 new jobs to the local economy this year alone.”
Portland was chosen as Coinbase’s customer service and HR hub due to the city’s “talented local blockchain communities.”
Coinbase has been steadily trying to position itself as an accredited, compliant finance institution: with its own fund packages, trading centers, customer service, HR, and a slew of new positions globally. They have also been trying to offer custodial services and investment bundles for larger firms, but the move still has to find its legs. Currently, many banks today are working on their own custodial services for crypto, or are looking to even open up their own trading markets. Therefore, Coinbase has much competition from established financial giants as it does within the cryptocurrency space itself.