Some of Ethereum’s largest token holders and most respected protocol researchers have joined forces to launch Ethlabs, a new independent research organization—one that frames its mission as nothing less than making Ethereum the financial settlement layer of the global economy.
Ethlabs, a non-profit research and development lab, was founded by five former Ethereum Foundation researchers and is being backed by publicly traded ETH treasury companies BitMine Immersion Technologies (NYSE: BMNR) and SharpLink (NASDAQ: SBET), along with SNZ Holding and Ethereum co-founder Joe Lubin. More than 50 other ecosystem contributors are listed as community supporters, including teams from layer-2 networks—secondary networks built on top of Ethereum to make it faster and cheaper—venture capital firms, and decentralized projects.
The founding team is Ansgar Dietrichs, Barnabé Monnot, Caspar Schwarz-Schilling, Josh Rudolf, and Julian Ma. Dietrichs will serve as executive director. The group previously worked on some of Ethereum’s most consequential technical upgrades over the past decade, covering areas including transaction finality, network scaling, data availability, and how the economics of the protocol are structured.
Dietrichs and Monnot are among the most cited Ethereum protocol researchers of the past decade. Dietrichs has been a central figure in Ethereum’s proposer-builder separation work—a design that separates who proposes new blocks of transactions from who builds them, a key mechanism for keeping the network fair and decentralized. Monnot is known for his research on MEV, or “maximal extractable value”—the profit miners and validators can extract by reordering or inserting transactions—and on the incentive structures that keep the network economically sound.
“The core belief: This is a unique moment for Ethereum. Adoption is here, the global economy is moving on-chain,” Dietrichs posted on X. “We want to help Ethereum realize its potential and become the shared global settlement layer.”
A New Node in a Larger Network
The lab’s launch comes one week after Ethereum Foundation co-director Hsiao-Wei Wang left her post, the latest in a string of departures from the organization that has long been seen as the primary steward of Ethereum’s development. Wang was the second co-executive director to leave the foundation this year, following Tomasz Stańczak’s resignation earlier in 2026. At least eight senior EF researchers and leaders announced departures in 2026, prompting calls in the community for a new organization more tightly focused on Ethereum’s protocol development and price competitiveness.
Lubin framed Ethlabs not as a replacement for the Ethereum Foundation, but as part of a broader decentralization of Ethereum’s stewardship:
“There is still an enormous amount of top tier talent in the Ethereum Foundation. Many of the brightest minds in Ethereum are at the EF focusing on the cypherpunk core components: CROPS,” he wrote on X. “There is only one Ethereum Foundation. But there are many other dimensions that brilliant Ethereum R&D teams will explore going forward.”
There is still an enormous amount of top tier talent in the Ethereum Foundation. Many of the brightest minds in Ethereum are at the EF focussing on the cypherpunk core components: CROPS.
There is only one Ethereum Foundation.
But there are many other dimensions that… https://t.co/tAOnKpM45k
— Joseph Lubin (@ethereumJoseph) June 22, 2026
Ethlabs describes itself as “independent but Ethereum is a shared project” and positions its role as “one node in a much larger network of stewards.” The organization posted on X that it sits “between two worlds: real usage from the builders at the frontier, and the protocol that has to support it”—translating what developers, institutions, and users actually need into protocol research, shared standards, and shipped products.
The Ethereum Foundation Responds
The Ethereum Foundation acknowledged the launch in an X thread, welcoming Ethlabs alongside a number of other recently formed independent Ethereum organizations.
“We’re looking forward to seeing what they build and how they help bring Ethereum’s core properties to more of the world,” the Foundation wrote.
The thread also named several other groups that have emerged in recent months: the Ethereum Applications Guild, The Ethereum Economic Zone, and Argot Collective—each oriented around different aspects of Ethereum’s development and ecosystem growth.
1/ Announced just today: @ethlabs_org, a non-profit R&D lab focused on the next era of adoption for Ethereum and ETH.
We’re looking forward to seeing what they build and how they help bring Ethereum’s core properties to more of the world.https://t.co/buxvPlzNZU
— Ethereum Foundation (@ethereumfndn) June 22, 2026
The Foundation closed on a notably philosophical note:
“The privilege of stewarding Ethereum must not be hoarded, but carefully shared with others committed to building the infrastructure of self-sovereignty, whether old friends or new travelers. We look forward to more arrivals in the months, years, decades and centuries to come.”
Institutional Focus
Ethlabs’ immediate research priorities are aimed squarely at removing the obstacles that prevent large financial institutions from operating on Ethereum at scale. Early work targets faster settlement, native asset issuance, cross-chain movement, mainnet capacity, and research around ETH’s monetary properties—the main areas institutions need to address before operating on Ethereum at scale.
The lab’s thesis page describes the project around a fork in the road for the global financial system: a fragmented world of competing blockchains versus Ethereum as a single universal settlement layer. Ethlabs backs the latter.
“The internet became global because shared protocols created a common language between networks,” the thesis reads. “Finance is approaching a similar moment.”
Three pillars underpin that thesis. First, credible neutrality—”ten years of uptime and the lowest counterparty risk. Ground that cannot be pulled away by any one country, institution, company, or person.” Second, ETH as the reference asset—”the most valuable, programmable store of value.” Third, a thriving builder and DeFi ecosystem open to anyone.
BitMine Chairman Tom Lee expressed confidence in Ethereum’s trajectory:
“We believe Ethereum is positioned to grow significantly in adoption by institutions and by AI agents. And naturally, the ecosystem needs to dramatically expand its investment in talent and research to support this growth,” he said in a statement. “The formation of Ethlabs demonstrates that key stakeholders are stepping up to help ensure Ethereum remains a leading platform for decentralized finance.”
Independent by Design
Despite having significant institutional backers, Ethlabs says funders will have no say over what it researches. Contributions flow through an independent grants administrator responsible for screening, valuation, and disbursement. Funders receive quarterly transparency reporting and are subject to an independent annual audit, but final decisions on research priorities and technical direction rest with Ethlabs leadership.
Precise funding amounts were not disclosed.
The launch also comes in the context of broader calls within the Ethereum community for a more economically aligned stewardship model. Last month, Ethereum researcher Dankrad Feist, who left the Ethereum Foundation for a role with Stripe’s stablecoin network Tempo, suggested a new group could “save Ethereum” if it tied itself economically to the network and its native token, ETH.
Whether Ethlabs becomes that group—or one of many—remains to be seen. What’s clear is that Ethereum’s research ecosystem is no longer centered solely in the Foundation.