OP Labs Cuts 20% of Staff to Focus on Core Business: Not Due to Financial Pressure

Odaily News: OP Labs, the infrastructure developer behind Optimism, announced a reduction of 20 employees, accounting for approximately 19.6% of its total team. In an internal letter, Jing Wang, Co-founder of Optimism and CEO of OP Labs, explicitly stated that this layoff is not due to financial pressure. The company currently has sufficient funds and multiple years of cash flow reserves. This move aims to "streamline operations, accelerate decision-making, and reduce collaboration costs."

Optimism is currently in a transition period. Last month, Base, the largest chain in the OP Stack ecosystem, announced it would transition to a self-developed unified tech stack. This change had raised market concerns about Optimism's long-term sustainability, causing the OP token price to drop by about 37% over the past 30 days. Despite the challenges, OP Labs has outlined a 2026 roadmap, focusing on faster block times, native interoperability, customizable compliance controls, and a Zero-Knowledge (ZK) Proof system aligned with the Ethereum roadmap. Additionally, OP token holders have previously passed a proposal to allocate 50% of Superchain sequencer revenue for token buybacks. (The Block)