Cardano founder declares ecosystem ready to thrive without him

Charles Hoskinson, founder of Cardano (CRYPTO:ADA), said on April 12 that the blockchain ecosystem has reached full decentralisation, hinting at a reduced role for himself as he embarks on a risky personal journey.

“This time it’s to go somewhere to do something that is quite dangerous—so much so there is a possibility of death,” Hoskinson said in a livestream titled “See you on the other side,” as he reflected on more than ten years of building Cardano

He noted the address was a precaution in case the expedition, which he has been planning for a year, does not end safely.

At the core of Hoskinson’s message was the announcement that Cardano’s governance is now fully decentralised.

He credited this milestone to the Voltaire framework, under which the project’s constitution has been ratified both at a constitutional convention and through on-chain voting.

“There are almost a thousand DREs [Delegated Representative Entities] registered and an interesting distribution of power amongst them,” Hoskinson said.

He emphasised that power has transitioned from the founding bodies to the community, with a transitional constitutional committee now in place and full democratic elections planned later this year.

Budget reconciliation among DRAPs (Delegated Representative Action Plans) is expected to conclude within two to three months.

“I wanted to build something where I could spend my entire life working on it, but I didn’t want to be a dictator or a king,” he said, comparing his decision to step back to Satoshi Nakamoto’s departure from Bitcoin.

Hoskinson also highlighted Cardano’s growing technical plurality, noting multiple independent node implementations are now being developed by teams like Pragma, TXPipe, Blink Labs, and Harmonic.

The Paris workshop he attended also included Ethereum community members, signaling interest in client diversity and cross-chain collaboration.

While Input Output Global will remain involved in the ecosystem, Hoskinson stated that the community now has control over how central its role will be going forward.

He also mentioned growing interest in Midnight, a privacy-focused protocol within Cardano, which may serve as a gateway for users across multiple blockchains.

At the time of reporting, the Cardano price was $0.6386.