It is no shock that there is a normal pivot from blockchain to synthetic intelligence proper now.
Each week brings one other report of an organization or particular person both leaving the cryptocurrency trade fully or including synthetic intelligence to their portfolios. Bitcoin miners are moving away from mining to more and more concentrate on AI infrastructure and enterprise capital corporations are funding AI corporations quite than crypto firms.
Nevertheless it’s uncommon when the main members of the identical staff depart one firm and leap into one other simply down the highway. That is precisely what seems to have occurred to the senior advertising and marketing staff at crypto change Coinbase (COIN), which, over the course of a yr or so, has landed at San Francisco-based OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT. Coinbase maintains a 150,000-square-foot office within the metropolis.
It is value noting that Coinbase employs numerous advertising and marketing employees and 6 — albeit fairly senior roles — make up solely a small portion of the whole staff.
The advertising and marketing expertise migration started with Sarah Russellwho joined OpenAI as VP, built-in advertising and marketing and ops in November 2024. She had spent one yr and three months because the senior director of built-in advertising and marketing at Coinbase, a place she left in January 2023. It is value noting that earlier in her profession, she labored at Fb’s (now Meta) Menlo Park headquarters.
A month later, Kate Rouch turned OpenAI’s chief advertising and marketing officer. Immediately previous to that, she spent three and a half years in the identical function at Coinbase. Earlier than that, she spent over 11 years as world head of name and product advertising and marketing at Meta.
Rouch was adopted by Every Karstenswho joined OpenAI as head of worldwide advertising and marketing in March 2025, although she did not transfer instantly. Karstens spent three months at a London-based paytech startup known as Finom. Karstens additionally spent over 10 years at Meta in varied advertising and marketing roles.
The next September noticed one other two transitions: Kaitlin Gianetti turned head of built-in advertising and marketing administration at OpenAI a month after leaving Coinbase, and Amy (Good) Robbins joined as model insights lead instantly after leaving Coinbase. Gianetti had spent simply over 4 years as director of built-in advertising and marketing at Coinbase. Previous to that, she additionally labored as a model advertising and marketing government at Meta. Robbins spent three and a half years as senior supervisor of insights at Coinbase.
Most just lately, Nina Mogavero joined OpenAI in December 2025 to work in advertising and marketing technique and operations, a month after leaving Coinbase the place she’d spent three years in advertising and marketing and technique.
An individual acquainted with the state of affairs stated the exodus was no coincidence. The particular person described Rouch because the “nexus,” with regards to attractive former Coinbase colleagues to maneuver over to OpenAI.
“To be honest, she employed quite a lot of them or introduced them from Fb,” they stated. Kate Rouch didn’t reply to a request for remark.
A Coinbase spokesperson brushed away the departures. “The advertising and marketing staff at Coinbase is over 150 individuals and whereas some of us have left to affix OpenAI final yr, and we want them one of the best, characterizing this as something apart from regular individuals strikes can be incorrect,” the spokesperson stated through electronic mail.
OpenAI didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Advertising and marketing is not the one division that is seen AI as extra enticing than crypto. Earlier this month, Tom Duff Gordonthe previous VP of worldwide coverage at Coinbase, left to change into OpenAI’s head of EMEA Coverage.
Different Coinbase alumni who’ve headed to OpenAI embody
- Yi Xwho joined the AI agency as product supervisor in April 2025
- The top of design at decentralized buying and selling platform Base, Alexandra Fitzroyleft Coinbase in October 2025 after simply over 5 years
- Abe Sprague left Coinbase in September 2024 to change into a member of OpenAI’s knowledge science staff.
OpenAI isn’t the one machine studying store to win over Coinbase advertising and marketing expertise. Earlier this month, Sarah Wolfthe advertising and marketing lead behind Coinbase’s Base layer-2 community, left after practically 5 years on the change to move startup advertising and marketing at AI lab Anthropic.
