Fantom Foundation has responded to the news of Andre Conje exiting crypto. The announcement which came early on Sunday saw Anton Nell and Andre Conje announce their departure from crypto and decentralized finance (DeFi) and any contribution thereof. This had sent shocked the community as it came seemingly out of nowhere, leaving many questioning the fate of the blockchain.
Fantom Foundation had been quick to respond and address these concerns, assuring the community that the departure would not adversely harm the development of the project in any way. The foundation explained that Conje’s contribution to crypto had been immense but that Fantom was not a “one-man team” meaning that the exit of a single dev would not derail the project in any way.
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Furthermore, Fantom Foundation added that Conje was not a “core dev”. The project will continue along in its development as there are more than 40 others who continue to work tirelessly towards the success of the network. In addition to hundreds of developers and 100K+ unique addresses that continue to carry out transactions on the network daily.
The foundation referred to Conje as a “big picture guy” who had worked closely with the CEO, but noted that his decision to leave the crypto world would have no impact on the network. Development will carry on as scheduled, the foundation explains, and are still on track to ship notable upgrades expected in the short term.
Therefore, the development of Fantom won't be impacted by Andre's decision.
Big things are coming, as scheduled.
We're still on track to ship snapsync and a db upgrade in the short term and to release middleware improvements such as flat storage and the fvm.
— Fantom Foundation (@FantomFDN) March 6, 2022
Why Is Andre Conje Leaving Fantom?
Conje had been a notable figure in the Fantom community going as far back as 2018 given his involvement and contribution to the development of the network. He further went on to spearhead popular projects like Yearn Finance (YFI) and Keep3r Network, alongside others, further solidifying his role as a key player on the Fantom network. This is why the dev’s exit has come as a shock.
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In an announcement that was posted on Twitter, Anton Nell explained that he and Conje had made the decision to leave crypto and DeFi. Explaining the reasoning behind this, Nell said that it was “not a knee-jerk reaction to the hate received from releasing a project, but a decision that has been coming for a while now.” This means that they have been planning the departure for a while.
Following the announcement, the prices of projects Conje was involved with had taken a plunge. Fantom’s FTM token had fallen 8% from above $1.5 to $1.39 and YFI had seen $3k wiped off its value as it plunged from $20K to $17K. These tokens have since begun to find balance after this but continue to suffer effects from the news.
FTM tumbles after Nell's announcement | Source: FTMUSD on TradingView.com
Featured image from CryptoWisser, chart from TradingView.com