A group of former Ethereum Foundation researchers have started a new nonprofit research and development organization backed by some of ether’s largest corporate holders, as the Ethereum ecosystem undergoes a major organizational shift.
Ethlabs, announced on Monday, is funded by two of the largest Ethereum treasury firms SharpLink Gaming (SBET), Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR), alongside with Ethereum co-founder and Consensys CEO Joe Lubin and several other entities including Anchorage Digital, Octant and SNZ.
The organization is led by five former senior Ethereum Foundation contributors: Ansgar Dietrichs, Barnabé Monnot, Caspar Schwarz-Schilling, Josh Rudolf and Julian Ma, according to the press release. The researchers worked on areas including Ethereum scaling, data availability, protocol economics and network finality.
The launch comes amid a period of upheaval at the Ethereum Foundation, the Switzerland-based nonprofit that coordinates much of Ethereum’s research and development efforts. Last week, co-executive director Hsiao-Wei Wang announced she would step down from her leadership position, adding to a growing list of exits from the organization. Ma and Monnot left the foundation earlier this year as part of those high-profile exits.
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