Polkadot Co-Founder Gavin Wood Quits CEO Role at Parity Technologies

Gavin Wood, the co-founder of blockchain platform Polkadot, is quitting his CEO role at Parity Technologies, a blockchain software development company, Bloomberg reported Friday. 

The outgoing CEO will be replaced by Bjorn Wagner, a co-founder of Parity. Wood remains the majority shareholder in the company.

Wood Steps Down as Parity’s CEO

Wood co-founded Parity after leaving the Ethereum Foundation in 2015. Parity is the company behind the development of the Polkadot and Kusama blockchains. In contrast to several crypto platforms laying off staff due to the bear market, the company recently added three top executives to its leadership team.

Wood assumed the Parity CEO role last year following the departure of Jutta Steiner, another co-founder of the company.

Stating reasons for quitting his CEO role, Wood said:

“The role of the CEO has never been one which I have coveted (and this dates back long before Parity). I can act at being a CEO well enough for a short while, but it’s not where I am going to find eternal happiness.”

Reports of Wood quitting his role negatively impacted the price of DOT, the native token of the Polkadot ecosystem. DOT fell sharply by 3% on the news and was trading at $5.81 at the time of writing. The token is also down 5% on the day and 88% below its all-time high of $55.

Crypto CEOs Stepping Down

Wood has now joined a growing list of Crypto CEOs quitting their roles amidst the current bear market. In August, Michael Moro, CEO of crypto brokerage company Genesis, stepped down from his role at the firm.

Last month, Jesse Powell also stepped down as CEO of U.S.-based crypto exchange Kraken. At the same time, Alex Mashinsky, CEO of bankrupt crypto lender Celsius Network, resigned.

While several crypto CEOs are quitting their roles, Brian Armstrong, the co-founder of crypto exchange Coinbase recently stated that he intends to remain CEO of the company for a very long time.