Ethereum Foundation Pushes Through Its Biggest Restructuring Yet

After criticism over governance and priorities, the Ethereum Foundation is making deep cuts to staff and budget. New groups like ETHLabs and Ethereum Institutional are taking over work around research and adoption.

Key Takeaways

• In 2026, the Ethereum Foundation went through its largest restructuring to date after facing criticism over governance, execution, and technical priorities.
• The organization shrank, adopted a new mandate, and cut 54 roles, while its annual operating budget dropped by about 40%.
• New groups such as ETHLabs, Ethereum Institutional, and EthSystems are now taking over work that once sat inside the foundation.

The Ethereum Foundation completed the biggest restructuring in its history in 2026. After months of criticism over governance, execution, and technical priorities, the organization became smaller, took on a new mandate, saw several senior leaders depart, and settled into a more defined role within the Ethereum ecosystem.

From Criticism to Reassessment

Pressure on the foundation had been building for months. Developers, investors, and prominent Ethereum community members argued that the organization was leaning too heavily on layer-2 scaling while giving base layer improvements too little attention. In February, co-executive director Tomasz Stańczak said he would step down, not long after the first major reorganization began.

A few weeks later, the foundation released a new mandate. It narrowed the group’s mission to long-term stewardship of Ethereum, with an emphasis on censorship resistance, resilience, openness, privacy, and security. The shift reflects a broader move to position the foundation as a guardian of the network’s core principles rather than its main builder or ecosystem coordinator.

Major Cut in June

The biggest change came in June. Co-executive director Hsiao-Wei Wang stepped down, and the foundation then announced a restructuring that removed about one-fifth of its staff. In total, 54 roles were eliminated and the annual operating budget was cut by about 40%. The remaining teams were reorganized into five core groups, each focused on work the foundation says it is uniquely suited to handle.

The budget reduction is meant to make the organization more financially sustainable over time. Under the new plan, the foundation wants to lower annual spending from about 15% to around 5% by 2030. That makes clear how much the focus has shifted away from broad coordination and growth toward a leaner structure with tighter priorities.

New Players Are Taking Over Tasks

At the same time, new organizations outside the foundation are stepping in to handle work that used to be done internally. ETHLabs launched as an independent nonprofit research group focused on protocol research, ecosystem coordination, and product development. Later, Ethereum Institutional followed, with a focus on enterprises, asset managers, and nonprofits that want to use Ethereum through research, education, and standards.

EthSystems also entered the picture as a for-profit company building infrastructure for confidential transactions on Ethereum for financial institutions. For European crypto readers, the main point is that this is another sign of how mature the network has become: instead of one central player, a growing set of specialized organizations and investment vehicles is forming around the same chain. That could continue to reshape how research, adoption, and infrastructure are organized, even if it does not point to an immediate market reaction.

This latest restructuring also fits a broader pattern at Ethereum since the foundation was created in 2014: the network’s core remains the same, but the organizations around it keep changing as the crypto market and technical demands evolve.