Giorgio Zinetti, the Cardano Foundation's Chief Technology Officer, will step down on Aug. 31, with the organization saying its board and management will continue working with technology and senior business development leaders under the current roadmap to keep corporate adoption in focus. The departure ends what the Foundation has described as an approximately two-and-a-half-year tenure overseeing technical strategy, product development and projects tied to broader Cardano adoption across one of crypto's largest proof-of-stake ecosystems. The Foundation has not publicly named a successor, instead pointing to continuity through existing leadership as Cardano advances governance upgrades and development of its on-chain governance framework. Cardano is backed by three separate entities: the Swiss-based not-for-profit Cardano Foundation, engineering and development arm Input Output Global led by Charles Hoskinson, and commercial arm Emurgo. In July, Emurgo said it would step down from Cardano's governance group after its wallet, SecondFi, was exploited and $2.4 million in ADA was lost. DeFiLlama data cited in the report put Cardano 29th by total value locked, with $69.62 million across 69 protocols, while ADA was trading at $0.1961 and had a market capitalization of $7.16 billion at the time of writing.