The Ethereum Foundation dismissed 54 employees and reduced its annual budget by roughly 40 percent on June 23 as part of a reorganization. The cuts follow the launch of EthLabs, a new research organization, the previous day. Officials described the changes as a shift toward a leaner structure focused on core protocol priorities.
On June 23 the nonprofit announced it had laid off about 20 percent of its workforce following a months-long review. The organization will narrow its work to protocol hardening, privacy protections and scaling improvements while moving compensation into ETH and stablecoins.
Vitalik Buterin said the Foundation is beginning a multiyear transition to an endowment-style model that spends about 5 percent of assets annually after 2030. Bastian Aue, interim co-executive director, noted the changes will align operations with the network’s technical constraints.
The moves coincide with record user activity on Ethereum yet continued weakness in ETH’s price, which has fallen more than 44 percent year to date. Joseph Chalom of SharpLink and Anatoly Yakovenko of Solana described the restructuring as a positive step toward greater decentralization.
