- The entire Electric Coin Company team behind Zcash development exited after governance changes.
- A new company will be formed to continue the same privacy-focused mission.
- The Zcash protocol remains unaffected despite leadership and governance turmoil.
Electric Coin Company, the long-standing development organisation behind Zcash, is preparing to start a new company following a sudden and highly public split tied to governance disputes.
According to public statements and reporting, the entire Electric Coin Company team has departed from its previous organisational arrangement with Bootstrap, the nonprofit created to support Zcash.
Notably, the exit was not framed as a routine resignation or gradual transition.
Instead, the company’s leadership described the situation as a breakdown in alignment that made continued work impossible.
The move marks a major turning point for one of the cryptocurrency industry’s most prominent privacy-focused projects.
Zcash has long positioned itself as “private money,” and the organisational fracture highlights growing tensions between mission-driven development teams and nonprofit governance structures.
Governance conflict at the centre of the split
At the core of the dispute is Bootstrap, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit created to support Zcash by governing the Electric Coin Company.
Josh Swihart, CEO of Electric Coin Company, publicly stated that a majority of Bootstrap board members had moved into clear misalignment with the mission of Zcash.
He specifically named Zaki Manian, Christina Garman, Alan Fairless, and Michelle Lai as central figures in that majority.
Swihart said that over recent weeks, changes imposed by the board altered the terms of employment for the Electric Coin Company team.
Those changes, according to his account, made it impossible for the team to perform their duties effectively and with integrity.
As a result, the entire team left after what Swihart characterised as constructive discharge.
Constructive discharge refers to situations in which working conditions are changed so significantly that employees are effectively forced to resign.
The framing suggests the split was driven by governance actions rather than disagreements over technology or code.
The dispute also exposed confusion around roles and titles, with Swihart acknowledging that public listings showing him as executive director of Bootstrap were outdated.
A new company, but the same mission
Despite the split, Swihart emphasised that the departing team is not abandoning its core vision.
He confirmed that the former Electric Coin Company team plans to found a new company.
The goal of that new entity, he said, remains building “unstoppable private money.”
This language mirrors Zcash’s long-standing emphasis on privacy, censorship resistance, and user sovereignty.
Importantly, Swihart and other figures stressed that the Zcash protocol itself is unaffected by the organisational changes.
Zcash’s codebase is open-source, and no single company owns or controls the network.
That distinction is critical for users and developers concerned about continuity and security.
Former Electric Coin Company CEO and Zcash founder Zooko Wilcox defended the Bootstrap board and stated that Zcash remains permissionless, secure, and safe to use.
His response highlighted the reality that leadership perspectives differ sharply on the causes and implications of the split.
Market reaction, Zcash price drops
ZEC, the native token of the Zcash network, saw a notable price drop in the aftermath of the announcement.
At press time, Zcash was trading at around $443.38, down 10.3% in a day, eroding the majority of its December gains.
The price decline reflects uncertainty around governance, leadership stability, and future development direction.
At the same time, supporters of the departing team argued that separating from what they view as hostile governance may ultimately strengthen development.
They see the creation of a new company as a way to protect mission-driven work from nonprofit board dynamics.
Critics, however, worry about fragmentation and the loss of institutional continuity.
The episode underscores broader challenges facing decentralised projects that rely on hybrid structures combining nonprofits, companies, and open-source communities.
