Coinbase Purchased Neutrino for $13.5 M, Acquisition Contract Shows

Cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase purchased controversial Italian software services provider Neutrino for $13.5 million (€12 million), a copy of a legal document dated February 15, 2019, and shared with Bitcoin Magazine reveals. The hard numbers of the acquisition were previously unknown.The document leak comes after a week of turbulent developments following the February 19 acquisition. Community members, namely Block Digest podcast member Janine, began to raise ethical concerns stemming from the company’s shared past with Hacking Team, an Italian, man-in-the-middle software provider whose malware and spyware has been linked to human rights and privacy abuses around the globe.This revelation invoked strong reactions among some community members, eventually manifesting in the #DeleteCoinbase movement. Coinbase ultimately buckled under the mounting pressure, announcing that it would be parting ways with Neutrino staff with ties to Hacking Team. Per the deal, Neutrino would “continue to operate as a standalone business based out of [Coinbase’s] London office,” meaning CRO Marco Valleri, CTO Alberto Ornaghi and CEO Giancarlo Russo were originally slated to stay on as executives until the severance.Marco Valleri and Alberto Ornaghi were both founders of Hacking Team, and Neutrino’s CEO, Giancarlo Russo, joined Hacking Team in 2004 as COO. At their new company, each executive held 22 percent of its shares — in capital allocation, ...