Changelly, an automated cryptocurrency exchange and a relatively new player on the market of cryptocurrency exchanges, made its services available to its users in April 2016 after six months of a successful beta.

However, are the newcomers able to compete with players who have already established their position on the market?

Changelly’s milestones so far

Interestingly, the launch of Changelly coincided with a time when another exchange platform, ShapeShift, went down, with reports that it had been compromised and threatened.

It was about the right time for Changelly to pop up, as consumers have been looking for alternative solutions that could provide a similar experience. No wonder the two companies have been unintentionally put in the position of competitors.

The main selling point of ShapeShift is that anyone from anywhere can instantly convert between supported cryptocurrencies without the need to register. Keeping customer privacy in mind, the platform does not ask for any documents to prove one’s identity.

Changelly was developed by MinerGate, one of the oldest mining pools on the market, that has about two mln users all over the world. At first glance, Changelly offers a similar interface to ShapeShift.

However, the options for converting between cryptocurrencies are slightly more modest. The Changelly platform is entirely different from ShapeShift, as it has an option for instant fiat payment with bank cards for any listed tokens, and there’s no account or id restrictions for crypto to crypto exchange transactions.

Still, ShapeShift sees banks as their main competitors

Competition on the market of instant cryptocurrency exchanges is growing and newcomers have to offer something new to make the user experience better. Changelly has enough ambitions to compete with ShapeShift. It looks like the company managed to outperform their main competitor traffic wise and most probably in terms of the trading volume as well.

Erik Voorhees, CEO at ShapeShift, commented:

“Business throughout the industry has been growing, both in Bitcoin and in other digital assets. ShapeShift had its best month ever in January, processing $20 mln in volume, up about 30 percent MoM, and throughout 2016 we grew roughly 9x.”

He believes that the growth of other companies is only good for the industry. However, he considers banks to be the main competitors to ShapeShift. “Our competition is the banks, their fiat currencies and the financial infrastructure that currently strangles the world,” explains Voorhees.

Why Charlie Shrem is collaborating with Changelly

This news comes at the same time when Charlie Shrem, a colleague and friend of Voorhees through BitInstant, has begun to collaborate with the Changelly team as a business development advisor.

Shrem managed to lead BitInstant to become one of the most well-known Bitcoin exchanges. Unfortunately, BitInstant was closed due to regulation issues.

Shrem said to Cointelegraph:

“I'm really excited to be working with Changelly as their business development advisor. Because of my relationships and long-standing business partnerships within the Bitcoin community, many companies ask me to work with them. I only work with companies I think have a bright future and I think Changelly is one of them. I’m going to make their volume grow 5x this year.”

The volumes of trading continue to increase and it is visible how the crypto exchange industry is maturing. It will inevitably lead to the tightening of competition between exchanges, as well as new players coming into the industry.

Existing and rather conservative fiat exchange platforms are starting to incorporate cryptocurrencies into their portfolios, while crypto exchanges are expanding trading options with more altcoins.

Shrem believes that over time the transaction volume from token-token would rise greater than fiat-token.

Changelly anticipates new collaboration and rapid growth

Changelly has grown 20x times since the launch and keeps growing by 30 percent each month. Konstantin Gladych, CEO at Changelly, believes that the number of tokens will be growing.

Gladych says to Cointelegraph:

“We are happy to work with Charlie Shrem. He is a reputable and well-known person on the market. He is helping us to grow our business relations with popular cryptocurrency services, expanding the network of our customers and partners. Our goal is to be the number one provider for instant tokens exchanging and become an entry point for newbies by accepting fiat payments for each listed coin.”

We will soon see the emergence of tokens for special business verticals and large-scale consumer projects, while perhaps even governments will start releasing their own tokens. Bitcoin will remain a reserve currency like gold, therefore demand for instant cryptocurrency exchange services will be growing rapidly.

“The competition is always healthy,” concludes Gladych, “as it encourages companies to provide better services for customers.”