IOTA drama behind the scenes: Now the founder of the coin speaks up

IOTA founder David Sønstebø was „removed“ from the IOTA Foundation on December 10th.
Now he has published an article on this. He says the aftermath of the breakup was avoidable.

IOTA founder David Sønstebø broke his silence on December 26th about the matter of his departure.

Sønstebø published a statement on Medium . In the posting, he gave his side of the story back and left public messages for the remaining board members of the IOTA Foundation.

Technically happy

For the public, IOTA was moving in a positive direction at the end of 2020. In December, IOTA formed a partnership regarding ecological sustainability solutions. On November 30th, the platform announced its next generation wallet – Firefly. In addition, the public test network of IOTA 1.5, called Chrysalis, went live. But behind the scenes the tension grew.

Only sparse at first

The first official indication that something was wrong came in the form of a short post on the IOTA Foundation (IF) blog. In it, the board of directors and the supervisory board declared that their interests and those of Sønstebø had „diverged significantly“. They thanked him for establishing the unit they led and wished him entrepreneurial success.

However, on December 12th, an addendum appeared on the blog. The foundation reminded readers that “IOTA is not about a single person.” At the same time, the foundation emphasized the role that David Sønstebø played in the establishment and initial development. They also wrote that his departure would change “absolutely nothing” in the strategy and delivery of Chrysalis and Coordicide.

Sønstebøs Answer

On December 26th, Sønstebø published his version of what happened. He explains that he was silent at first so that the publication of Chrysalis could continue.

Sønstebø claims that what prompted him to write his article was the preventable chaos created by the IOTA Foundation. His departure, he writes, could have been coordinated between him and IF to suppress loose talk.

Rather than describing a tit-for-tat style of attack, Sønstebø points to three salient features of the development of the project that led to the split. He focuses on the maturity of the project and the need for a separate CEO / COO.

Then he focuses on the finances (especially in 2020) and his repeated proposal to liquidate the foundation to keep the IOTA project itself independent of the markets.

He also emphasizes that the liquidation proposal was not due to financial problems of the IOTA Foundation. Finally, he describes a panicked board member who sees a potential benefit – the creation of new services – slipping away. In his opinion, as the founder, they never had this opportunity.