Monex’s Coincheck acquires Metaps Alpha
Coincheck, a subsidiary of Monex Group, Inc. (TYO:8698), today announces that it has concluded a share transfer agreement with Metaps Inc. to acquire all of the shares of its subsidiary Metaps Alpha Inc. Following the completion of the transaction, Metaps Alpha Inc. will become a subsidiary of Coincheck.
Regarding the business rationale for the deal, Coincheck explains that, in August 2020, it announced that it would leverage its capabilities of the existing cryptocurrency exchange and market-place business to begin providing in fiscal year 2020 a marketplace for trading NFTs (non-fungible tokens). At present, the expansion of the NFT marketplace has exposed scalability problems related to transaction processing on the Ethereum blockchain.
To circumvent these issues as well as make NFT transactions easier, Coincheck is working on the development of an off-chain NFT marketplace that does not have a gas fee.
With the increase in demand for Ethereum last year and the emergence of scalability problems, a number of different products are being promoted in countries around the world. Against this backdrop, Coincheck decided to provide both an off-chain and on-chain NFT marketplace. As part of this effort, Coincheck has decided to acquire Metaps Alpha Inc., a company that has been offering an on-chain NFT marketplace called miime since September 2019, and make it into a subsidiary.
While the trade name and management structure of Metaps Alpha Inc. will change, the service miime will continue to be offered under a different brand name than Coincheck. Current customers of miime will be able to continue using the service without the need for any new applications or procedures.