eBay Purchases ‘KnownOrigin’ NFT Marketplace One Month After Launching ‘Genesis’ Collection

US-based online e-commerce giant eBay has acquired Manchester-based NFT marketplace named ‘KnownOrigin’. The amount of capital that went into finalising this deal remains undisclosed. As part of this acquisition, the three co-founders of KnownOrigin — Andy Gray, David Moore, and James Morgan — will be joining the eBay team. The deal was finalised on June 21. eBay announced about the development in an official blog post. It revealed that KnownOrigin’s entire team has also been onboarded with the eBay team.

The 26-year-old e-commerce platform has been making efforts to establish itself as a significant brand in the NFT arena.

“eBay is the first stop for people across the globe who are searching for that perfect, hard-to-find, or unique addition to their collection and, with this acquisition, we will remain a leading site as our community is increasingly adding digital collectibles,” Jamie Iannone, CEO of eBay said in the blog-post.

Founded in 2018, KnownOrigin allows NFT artists and collectors to make, purchase, and re-sell non-fungible tokens (NFTs).

“As interest in NFTs continues to grow, we believe now is the perfect time for us to partner with a company that has the reach and experience of eBay. This is the start of a new chapter in the KnownOrigin story. This partnership will help us attract a new wave of NFT creators and collectors,” David Moore, the co-founder of KnownOrigin said in a statement.

Earlier in May, eBay released its debut NFT collection named ‘Genesis’. It features 3D and animated representation of Canadian hockey legend Wayne Gretzky. NFT versions of other sport players who made it to the covers of the Sports Illustrated magazine over the years, were also listed for sale.

The sales of NFTs reached $25 billion (roughly Rs. 1,84,700 crore) in 2021 as the speculative crypto asset exploded in popularity, data from market tracker DappRadar showed.

Until a few months ago, OpenSea was the sole reigning name in the NFT marketplace, but in recent times, more brands are cropping up.

This month, US-based software company Salesforce launched of its NFT platform named ‘NFT Cloud’.

In January, newly launched LooksRare marketplace had recorded a sales volume of $394 million (roughly Rs. 2,912 crore) within just three days of its launch.