TechFlow News, March 31: Brian Armstrong, CEO of Coinbase, revealed in an interview that the company has launched an internal venture capital program named “Next Bets” to prevent promising ideas and top talent from leaving. The program opens twice annually for company-wide proposal submissions; employees can pitch their projects directly to a review panel composed of product leads. A project advances as soon as it secures funding approval from any one of the leads—operating similarly to an internal venture capital model.
Armstrong added that the mechanism was inspired by Steve Wozniak’s departure from Hewlett-Packard after his idea failed to gain internal support, leading him to co-found Apple. The goal is to retain high-potential ideas and talent. “Next Bets” initiatives are typically driven by small teams of two to three people, with relatively modest funding—but focused on high-potential, failure-tolerant innovation. Notably, the Base blockchain project originated from this program, and updates on new projects are expected within the coming weeks.
