Startup profile for OpenBazaar: latest funding, latest known valuation, total disclosed funding, investors, status, sources, and why the company is interesting. Part of the Venture Capital Tracker startup directory.
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OpenBazaar funding, valuation and investors

Decentralized peer-to-peer marketplace protocol; OB1 was the company supporting development.

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Funding, valuation & investors

Answer-first snapshot

Latest funding

Seed

$3M · December 2016

Latest known valuation

Not publicly disclosed

Total disclosed equity funding

$4M

Excludes debt, grants, acquisitions, secondaries, and IPO proceeds.

Current status

shutdown

Stage not recorded · Washington, D.C., USA

Investors in latest funding

Lead: BlueYard Capital

Other: Andreessen Horowitz , Union Square Ventures

Sources: latest funding Last verified: 2026-07-25

Overview

OpenBazaar was an open-source protocol and desktop app for peer-to-peer online trade without a central company controlling listings or payments — users connected directly and paid in cryptocurrency. OB1 Inc. was the venture-backed company maintaining the software. Andreessen Horowitz and Union Square Ventures co-invested in OB1's $1M seed (June 2015) and participated in a $3M round (December 2016) led by BlueYard Capital. The project represented an early attempt at decentralized e-commerce; active development and usage declined in later years as centralized marketplaces dominated.

Why OpenBazaar is interesting

Early crypto-commerce experiment — a16z and USV backed OB1 ($1M seed 2015, $3M 2016) to sustain open-source P2P trade without a central intermediary, years before NFT marketplaces.

Product & use cases

OpenBazaar let anyone run a store node, list products, and trade P2P using Bitcoin and other crypto — no central server held inventory or payment data. OB1 built the reference client and protocol improvements.

  • Censorship-resistant online selling without platform fees
  • Crypto-native merchants avoiding payment processor restrictions
  • Experimentation with decentralized reputation and escrow multisig
  • Open-source commerce research precursor to NFT and DeFi marketplaces

Key facts

  • Seed (Jun 2015): $1M with a16z and USV — USV blog, CoinDesk
  • Follow-on (Dec 2016): $3M led by BlueYard; a16z and USV participated — CoinDesk
  • Forked from 'Dark Market' hackathon project; led by Brian Hoffman at OB1
  • Open-source MIT-licensed protocol
  • Co-investors not in VCT directory: BlueYard Capital, Digital Currency Group (early grant/backing per press)

Funding history (newest first)

Seed

2016-12 $3M

Source: https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2016/12/05/openbazaar-raises-3-million-to-build-p2p-marketplace

Seed

2015-06 $1M

Source: https://www.usv.com/writing/2015/06/usv-and-a16z-invest-in-openbazaar/

Investors in our directory

Funds linked from OpenBazaar's profile — open a fund page for stage focus and related deal articles.

Andreessen Horowitz Union Square Ventures

Competitive landscape

Edge: True decentralization — no company could delist sellers or seize funds; early mover in crypto commerce with top-tier VC backing for protocol development.

Decentralized marketplaces struggle with liquidity, UX, and dispute resolution vs centralized incumbents. OpenBazaar proved technical feasibility but could not sustain active user growth. Historical interest remains for understanding early a16z crypto commerce thesis and protocol-design tradeoffs.

  • eBay incumbent

    Centralized marketplace with buyer protection; vastly larger liquidity than OpenBazaar ever achieved.

  • OpenSea adjacent

    Later crypto marketplace wave focused on NFTs with centralized UX; different asset class but overlapping crypto-commerce audience.

  • LocalBitcoins / P2P crypto adjacent

    P2P crypto trading platforms; overlapping cypherpunk user base.

Notable stories

  • OpenBazaar originated from the Dark Market proof-of-concept at a Toronto hackathon, rebranded to emphasize legitimate commerce over illicit associations — CoinDesk coverage (2015).
  • a16z and USV jointly backing OB1 signaled early VC interest in protocol-layer marketplaces before Ethereum DeFi summer.

Industries

Crypto & Web3 Marketplaces Consumer

Related funding articles

Venture Capital Tracker pieces that cover OpenBazaar's financing or category context.

FAQs about OpenBazaar

Practical answers founders, operators, and investors typically search for.

OpenBazaar was a decentralized peer-to-peer marketplace protocol and app. Users traded directly using cryptocurrency without a central company controlling the marketplace.
Andreessen Horowitz (/fund/andreessen-horowitz) and Union Square Ventures (/fund/union-square-ventures) invested in OB1's $1M seed (2015) and $3M round (2016).
OpenBazaar development and active use declined significantly after its peak in the mid-2010s. Treat as a historical crypto-commerce project unless official sources announce revival.
OB1 Inc. was the venture-backed company that developed and maintained the OpenBazaar open-source software, funded by a16z, USV, and BlueYard.
Buyers and sellers used cryptocurrency (primarily Bitcoin) with multisig escrow for dispute resolution — no traditional payment processor in the loop.
eBay is centralized with buyer protection and massive liquidity. OpenBazaar removed intermediaries but could not match eBay's trust, discovery, or volume.
Decentralized marketplaces face cold-start liquidity, complex UX, and slower dispute resolution. Centralized apps (including later NFT marketplaces) won on convenience.
The OpenBazaar project launched in 2014; OB1 raised its first VC seed in June 2015.
No. The project explicitly rebranded from 'Dark Market' to promote legitimate P2P commerce, though decentralization attracted cypherpunk and crypto-libertarian users.
OpenBazaar was general P2P goods with Bitcoin. OpenSea is a centralized NFT marketplace on Ethereum — different era, asset type, and architecture.
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