We propose a simple scheme to generate high-energy ultrashort pulses by combination and compression of multiple input pulses which share the same chirp profile. First, the multiple raised-cosine pulses in the input pulse train are modulated by a phase modulator, in which each modulation cycle covers two, three, four, or five pulses. Then, the modulated pulses are launched into a nonlinear fiber with the exponentially decreasing dispersion. We find that these pulses initially coalesce into a single pulse whose pulse profile is nearly hyperbolic secant, which then undergoes self-similar compression. Thus in the proposed method, first the combination of the multiple optical pulses occurs and then self-similar compression takes over. Besides, we also report the generation of ultrashort pulses by combination and compression of multiple hyperbolic secant pulses with the same chirp. The numerical results reveal that the resulting ultrashort pulse possesses a large portion of the input pulses for both raised-cosine and hyperbolic secant pulses. However, the compression factor and energy ratio are relatively higher for the hyperbolic secant pulses when compared with the raised-cosine pulses. © 1965-2012 IEEE.