a16z-backed Eco unveils Beam, a P2P crypto transfer service aiming to be a 'global Venmo'

The crypto payments space is seeing a surge of activity these days as developers strive to make decentralized finance as user-friendly as web2 experiences. Eco Inc, an a16z-backed payments startup that's raised $95 million in funding to date, just unveiled a decentralized payments project called Beam. In an interview with TechCrunch, the company's CEO Andy Bromberg described Beam as a non-custodial payment system that functions like a "global Venmo."