# #974 - EF Staff Cuts, Former Researchers Launch Ethlabs, ENS Treasury Debated *The Ethereum Foundation lays off 20% of staff, former EF researchers launch Ethlabs, ENS treasury custody proposal, and Aztec hits Stage 2.* By [ETH Daily](https://ethdaily.io) · 2026-06-23 news, june2026, 2026 --- Gm, Happy Tuesday! Ethereum is entering a new era. Vitalik coined the Ethereum Strawmap as the third iteration of Ethereum. The second iteration was The Merge. The first was Frontier. Quick Take ---------- * EF cuts 54 employees. * Ethlabs independent R&D lab. * Bastian outlines execution roadmap. * ENS treasury delegation controversy. * Aztec achieves Stage 2 rollup status. * * * Advertise --------- [![](https://storage.googleapis.com/papyrus_images/451cc866a3d850b22fc8dd1db907f94a08090ffffe29963d21a2257b4abacfe7.png)](https://ethdaily.io/ads) The trusted Ethereum news briefing since 2022, reaching 6,000+ audio subscribers, 4,000+ newsletter subscribers, and 26k+ combined social followers. Want to reach the ETH Daily audience? Learn more at [ethdaily.io/ads](https://ethdaily.io/ads). * * * Ethereum Foundation Reorganizes, Cuts Staff ------------------------------------------- The Ethereum Foundation [reorganized](https://ethdaily.io/ethereum-foundation-reorganizes-cuts-staff) its team and cut approximately 20% of its headcount, laying off 54 employees following a 40 percent reduction in its budget. The reductions stem from an updated treasury management policy targeting a long-term annual spend of 5% by 2030. Departing personnel will receive severance and transition grants, with many expected to remain contributors outside the foundation, such as at the newly formed Ethlabs. As part of this transition, remaining staff will be consolidated into five core layers: Protocol, Access, User, Community, and Institutional. To operate under these tighter budget constraints, the multi-client model will shift from client redundancy to client specialization, security efforts will transition toward AI-assisted formal verification, and the Privacy and Scaling Explorations (PSE) team will wind down. Former EF Researchers Launch Ethlabs ------------------------------------ Five former Ethereum Foundation researchers [launched](https://ethdaily.io/former-ef-researchers-launch-ethlabs) Ethlabs, an independent nonprofit research and development organization focused on accelerating developer and institutional Ethereum adoption. Founded by Ansgar Dietrichs, Barnabé Monnot, Caspar Schwarz-Schilling, Josh Rudolf, and Julian Ma, the lab seeks to bridge the gap between actual network usage and core protocol integration. Its immediate research roadmap centers on engineering requirements for scaling institutional activity, including faster settlement, robust cross-chain messaging, mainnet capacity expansion, and maintaining the monetary properties of ETH. The initiative is backed by prominent ecosystem players including Bitmine Immersion Technologies, Sharplink, Anchorage, Octant, SNZ, and Joe Lubin. EF Outlines Core Execution Roadmap ---------------------------------- Ethereum Foundation Interim Executive Director Bastian Aue [outlined](https://ethdaily.io/ef-outlines-core-execution-roadmap) the organization's execution roadmap, detailing how defensive strategies are being translated into protocol actions. To align with the network's operational constraints, the foundation is shifting its financial relationships and employee compensation toward ETH and native stablecoins. The roadmap prioritizes capturing maximal extractable value (MEV) as a core protocol problem, utilizing whole-system coordination for initiatives like fork-choice enforced inclusion lists (FOCIL) and enshrined proposer-builder separation (ePBS). Additionally, the roadmap focuses on securing transaction pathways via unconditional onchain privacy defaults at the access layer (see our [Ethereum privacy tracker](https://ethdaily.io/ethereum-privacy-tracker)) and accelerating the transition to a post-quantum cryptographic migration to protect Ethereum's settlement layer. ENS Proposal Gives Treasury Control To ENS Foundation ----------------------------------------------------- ENS Labs COO Katherine Wu [introduced](https://ethdaily.io/ens-proposal-gives-treasury-control-to-ens-foundation) a controversial governance proposal to transfer operational management and custody of approximately $400 million in treasury assets from the ENS DAO to an expanded ENS Foundation. The proposed five-seat board would include founder Nick Johnson, executive director Alex Urbelis, and three independent directors receiving $40,000 USDC annually. The proposal has sparked intense debates because Nick Johnson recently self-delegated 3.1 million ENS tokens, handing him nearly 50% of the active voting power and enabling him to unilaterally meet quorum. Delegates like Rotki founder Lefteris Karapetsas criticized the restructuring as a takeover of the treasury, while Johnson defended the move as necessary due to declining participation from other token holders. Aztec Achieves Stage 2 Rollup Decentralization ---------------------------------------------- Aztec [achieved](https://ethdaily.io/aztec-achieves-stage-2-rollup-decentralization) Stage 2 rollup decentralization under L2BEAT standards after its onchain governance voted to revoke ownership of the core rollup smart contract. This change makes the critical contract code and configurations completely immutable, shortening governance delay from 30 days to just two days while leaving an immutable onchain escape hatch for user withdrawals. Other News ---------- * Geth v1.17.4 [release](https://github.com/ethereum/go-ethereum/releases/tag/v1.17.4) * Lighthouse v8.2.0 [release](https://x.com/sigp_io/status/2069037719771087107) * Base MCP [skill plugins](https://x.com/base/status/2069461526444900842) * Peer website [refresh](https://x.com/peerxyz/status/2069131849499136466) * * * Disclaimer: Content is for informational and educational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, legal, or other professional advice. No representations or warranties are made as to accuracy, completeness, or timeliness. Use of this content is at your own risk, and you should consult a qualified professional before making decisions. No fiduciary or advisory relationship is created --- *Originally published on [ETH Daily](https://ethdaily.io/974)*