Zcash founder weighs in on Ethereum concerns

• Zcash cofounder Eli Ben-Sasson shared his views on recent concerns surrounding the Ethereum Foundation and Ethereum's future development.
• His comments follow several senior departures from the Ethereum Foundation and debate over long-term funding for core development.
• Ben-Sasson said he hopes future ecosystem decisions place greater emphasis on technology and merit.

Ethereum (CRYPTO:ETH) came under renewed scrutiny after Zcash cofounder Eli Ben-Sasson commented on recent concerns surrounding the Ethereum Foundation, including leadership departures and funding discussions.

The remarks follow the departure of multiple senior Ethereum Foundation figures over the past five months, while some community members have raised concerns about future funding for core protocol development.

“I'm here to share my point of view as a friend of Ethereum and head of an L2 that has been scaling it for quite a few years now,” said StarkWare cofounder and Zcash founding scientist Eli Ben-Sasson.

Ben-Sasson said Ethereum has significant strengths but also faces political challenges, referencing earlier criticism StarkWare received for pursuing STARK-based scaling technology and zero-knowledge virtual machine development.

The comments come as former Ethereum Foundation contributor Trent Van Epps warned of a potential funding shortfall for core development, while investor Tom Lee stated there was zero chance of a funding crisis occurring; following the discussion the Ethereum price reaction was not disclosed.

Ben-Sasson highlighted StarkWare's work on post-quantum ZK-STARK technology for Ethereum during 2019 and 2020, noting that the approach was considered unpopular by some participants at the time.

He added that he hopes future developments within the Ethereum ecosystem place greater weight on technological merit and innovation rather than alignment with prevailing community views.

At the time of reporting, Ethereum price was $1,725.04.