Lane Kasselman

Kasselman began his career in politics, working for two California governors; he served as deputy policy director for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom (later governor of California) and worked with then-Senator Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential exploratory committee. He holds degrees from California State University, Sacramento, and Golden Gate University School of Law.⁠[1][2][1][3][1]

Since 2009, Kasselman has run Kasselman LLC, a boutique non-partisan public affairs firm he founded that has worked with campaigns, officials, companies and nonprofits, including Newsom’s campaign for governor.⁠[3]

He served as director of communications and public affairs for AT&TAT&TAT&T (AT&T Inc.) is a telecommunications company headquartered in Dallas, Texas. Its predecessor was SBC Communications, a regional holding company created in the 1984 breakup of the Bell System; SBC merged with the original AT&T Corp. in 2005 and adopted its name, and it has since operated a nationwide wireless network and fiber broadband, at one time also owning DIRECTV and WarnerMedia.Open the full entry, where he built a national model for winning regulatory and land-use campaigns in local markets; he then led communications and public affairs for the Americas at Uber, helping create permanent regulatory frameworks for Uber’s products in many places.⁠[2][4][2]

Kasselman co-founded the crisis communications firm Greenbrier with Matt McKenna, a former spokesperson for Bill Clinton. The firm’s website says it was founded in 2015, while a conference biography of Kasselman gives 2017. Greenbrier began as a crisis communications specialist whose clients ranged from Silicon Valley unicorns to heads of state and celebrities; Kasselman helped the leadership of companies such as Lyft, Lime, Instacart, Epic Games, Quibi and ByteDance. In 2016, Blockchain.com retained Greenbrier, and the two have worked together ever since.⁠[5][6][3][4][7]

In late 2017, Greenbrier was acquired by The Messina GroupThe Messina GroupThe Messina Group (TMG) is a strategic consulting firm founded in Washington, D.C., in 2013 by the American political adviser Jim Messina. It applies campaign-style data analytics, communications and coalition strategies to political campaigns, policy advocacy and corporate matters, and its clients include party leaders in several countries and technology companies. On October 14, 2026, the firm was renamed Fortius Global.Open the full entry, the strategic consultancy founded by Jim MessinaJim MessinaJim Messina is an American Democratic political adviser who spent years on the staff of Montana Senator Max Baucus, served as White House deputy chief of staff from 2009 to 2011, and managed Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign. He then founded the strategic consulting firm The Messina Group (renamed Fortius Global in October 2026), which provides campaign and strategic advice to political parties in several countries, including the UK Conservative Party, and to companies.Open the full entry; TMG announced the merger on January 17, 2018, by which time Kasselman had spent two decades advising start-ups, celebrities and political campaigns on public policy, crisis strategy and communications. He subsequently became a partner at TMG.⁠[6][5][5][4]

As co-founder and managing partner of Greenbrier and a former head of communications at Uber, Kasselman discussed on crisis management expert Edward Segal’s podcast The Crisis Ahead how Uber responds to crises, as well as a crisis he handled for the fitness app Strava. He said the only way out was to figure out how to minimize the impact; the team issued a statement expressing sympathy and laying out the facts, and by the Tuesday of that week the coverage had been contained.⁠[8][8][8][8][8]

After raising $120 million, Blockchain.com hired Kasselman as its first chief business officer. CEO and co-founder Peter Smith said Kasselman had been a trusted adviser to the company for nearly six years and had been with the team for some of its most critical moments; he would lead the corporate development, capital markets, partnerships and government affairs teams and help expand the public-facing side of the business.⁠[4][4][4][4][4]

Blockchain.com acquired the Argentine fintech platform SeSocio and opened an office in Brazil; as chief business officer, Kasselman explained the company’s growth plans in Brazil and said Latin America presents one of the greatest growth opportunities in crypto over the next decade.⁠[1][1][1][1]

On February 13, 2025, Kasselman, as president of Blockchain.com, took part in a fireside chat on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange at the 12th Annual IPO Summit, discussing the crypto landscape, institutional interest, regulatory trends and expanding crypto access in underserved markets.⁠[2][1][2]

In August of that year, when Blockchain.com added former KPMG chief executive Timothy Flynn and others to its board, Kasselman described the company’s three main lines of business: wallets for retail users, crypto services for hedge funds and other institutions, and asset management, which includes venture capital investments, high-frequency trading and work with digital asset treasury firms; he described the nine-member board as “spanning from Wall Street to Web 3.”⁠[9][9][9][9]

Blockchain.com announced that Kasselman would serve as co-CEO, sharing responsibilities with founder Peter Smith, who remains at the London global headquarters as CEO and executive chairman, while the company opened a US headquarters in Dallas, Texas. As of October 2026, his title at the company is co-CEO and president.⁠[10][10][1][1]

In 2026, he gave several interviews on the company’s strategy: he argued that the Cayman Islands’ early adoption of crypto regulation would future-proof its financial services sector against disruption; he said FTX and Celsius grew fast by “skirting the law,” while Blockchain.com grew more slowly, asked regulators for permission and hired during the crashes; and he said the company’s focus on infrastructure positions it to endure beyond market cycles.⁠[1][1][1][1]

Kasselman is also an adviser and investor to growing startups, advising Lime, Firefly and Strava; he is a general partner in Goldbriar Ventures, which advises early-stage startups facing significant political, regulatory or public relations challenges and opportunities.⁠[2][2]