Cardano has taken a step rarely seen among major blockchains: its own creator is relinquishing control. Input Output (IOG), the founding development firm behind Cardano, announced Friday that it will hand over control of core blockchain infrastructure to external specialist firms starting in August. The timing could hardly be more dramatic - coming just a day before the major Van Rossem hard fork goes live on mainnet.
What is being handed over is no trivial stack: the Haskell node, the Plutus smart contract platform, the Daedalus wallet, and the Hydra scaling technology - all are transitioning to outside hands. The new guiding motto is straightforward: “Built by many, owned by all.”
Who Is Taking Over
Two names have been tapped to carry the torch: Se7en Labs, a developer agency with roots in Solana infrastructure, and Teragone, a cryptographic research team that has led the development of Mithril - Cardano’s stake-based threshold signature protocol. Moving forward, at least three independent node implementations in Haskell, Rust, and Go will run in parallel under the supervision of community bodies Intersect and Pragma. The transition is slated to run through 2027.
Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson described the move as the final push of the Voltaire era - the governance and decentralization phase being built out since 2024. “Our partners are ready, and the ecosystem now has diverse options,” he said. IOG will shift its focus to research and new ventures via IO Labs and IO Ventures, while leaving the burden of proof to the community: whether a decentralized engineering model can truly move faster than the legacy approach.
Van Rossem and Depressed ADA Prices
Tomorrow, July 18 at 21:44 UTC, the Van Rossem hard fork will officially go live on mainnet. The upgrade was ratified on July 13 with 77.63% approval from delegated community representatives. It transitions Cardano to Protocol Version 11 and introduces new Plutus built-in functions that slash smart contract execution costs.
Unfortunately, prices have yet to reflect that optimism. ADA remains far below its 2024 peak near $1.20 and has steadily weakened since August 2025, with the 50-week EMA trailing below the 200-week EMA. Its RSI sits at 34 - near the oversold threshold below 30 - while the ADX points to a strong long-term bearish trend. One analyst even characterized buying at current levels as a “leap of faith, not a high-conviction trade.”
A Big Bet at 16 Cents
Yet ADA has a track record of surprising traders. If Van Rossem succeeds in cutting costs, the Leios upgrade arrives on schedule, and the decentralized engineering model proves more productive than the status quo, holders at the 16-cent level could stand to see substantial upside. The remaining question is simple yet pivotal: can the community prove that being “built by many” is faster than being built by a single company? The answers will begin to unfold in August.
Reported via Decrypt.
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Disclaimer: This article is for informational and educational purposes only, not financial advice. Cryptocurrency assets are highly volatile and carry significant risk. Always do your own research (DYOR) and never invest more than you can afford to lose.
