Jesse Pollak, best known as the creator of US crypto exchange Coinbase’s Layer 2 network, has been seen as the person largely responsible for the network’s growth in popularity this year.
Pollak, who started at Coinbase in 2017, launched Base in 2023. Designed to make doing business on-chain cheaper and easier and to support a new wave of decentralized applications, Base represented the first time a major crypto exchange launched its own Layer 2 network.
This year, Base has seen significant growth: crossing $15 billion in total value locked (TVL) in January and becoming one of the largest L2s by $10 billion (Arbitrum is the only Layer 2 network larger than Base).
Base’s growing popularity is not only due to low transaction costs – well below a penny – but also the growth of DeFi applications available in its ecosystem, as well as social applications and memecoins which have generated growth over the past year. (Pollak’s rising stardom was dampened slightly when he faced strong backlash following the launch of his memecoin $JESSE in November, after many users claimed bots cornered much of the supply and the token siphoned liquidity from other grassroots projects.)
In 2025, several projects on Coinbase’s core network have become major drivers of the ecosystem, with projects such as decentralized exchange Aerodrome Finance, which reached over $1 billion in TVL as of January 2025 and a core liquidity hub for the chain. Zora, a decentralized social network, also stood out, launching its token in April and riding the growing trend of Base’s on-chain creator economy. More broadly, Base itself has seen explosive growth in DeFi, social, and meme-based applications, creating a feedback loop that amplifies demand for native protocols as the network positions itself as a hotbed for this type of on-chain culture and experimentation.
As for what the chain has in store next: Pollak hinted that a native token could be coming to Base, creating a lot of anticipation among users already conducting activity.
Read more: Base explores native token issuance, says creator Jesse Pollak
