- Base and Optimism have agreed to share profits and jointly govern the two platforms
- The profit-sharing arrangement will see Base forfeit a percentage of its revenue or profits in exchange for Optimism’s OP Tokens
- The move will also require Base to get a nod from Optimism before conducting upgrades on its smart contract
Coinbase’s Ethereum layer two platform Base and Ethereum sidechain Optimism have announced a deal that will see the two platforms share profits and also have a say in how either of them runs its affairs. The agreement will see Base forfeit 15% of its profits or 2.5% of its revenue depending on which is higher in exchange for Optimism’s OP Tokens that will give it a seat on Optimism’s governance table. Optimism will also contribute to Base’s governance decisions such as smart contract upgrades, a move that’s meant to strengthen Optimism’s superchain status.
Balancing Profits with Common Good
The deal is part of Base joining the Optimism Collective, a group of Optimism-powered entities working together to balance between “earning a profit and building for the common good.”
This month marked a momentous first for Ethereum: a publicly listed US company incubated and launched an OP Chain powered by Optimism.
But @BuildOnBase represents so much more than just technological validation of the OP Stack.https://t.co/E1Pow0LIlk
— Optimism (✨🔴_🔴✨) (@optimismFND) August 24, 2023
Disclosing the details of the agreement, the Optimism Collective revealed that the arrangement revolves around protocol management, economics and governance. The collaboration employs a multi-signature wallet controlled by the two platforms.
The Optimism Collective also noted that the amount of OP Tokens received by Base will not exceed 9% of all coins dedicated to voting. Base’s Jesse Pollak, in a separate post, confirmed the collaboration adding that the protocol is committed to decentralization, something that a section of the crypto community thinks it’s yet to achieve.
BASE is a “stage 0 optimistic rollup” aka centralized aka essentially a glorified enterprise blockchain that *could become* decentralized in the future https://t.co/lIP31bMNIs
— _gabrielShapir0 (@lex_node) February 23, 2023
Base Beating Ethereum, For Now
The partnership comes a few days after the Base mainnet went live, although, despite its infancy, it has attracted a fair share of criticism and success. The platform has, for example, been accused of housing over 500 scam tokens but has surpassed Ethereum in daily transactions.
With the Optimism team assessing Base’s upgrades before they happen, it’s likely to lead to more stable upgrades and secure Base smart contracts.
