Cardano rises as Input Output prepares to hand off core development

Cardano’s ADA token moved higher Friday after Input Output said it will begin handing control of key Cardano software to outside engineering firms. For everyday crypto investors, the move matters because Cardano is trying to reduce its dependence on its founding developer while a major network upgrade is about to go live.

Input Output said the transition starts in August and will continue through 2027. The company plans to transfer responsibility for the Haskell node, the Plutus smart-contract platform, the Daedalus wallet, and Hydra, a scaling tool designed to help Cardano process activity more efficiently.

A blockchain node is software that helps run and verify a network. Smart contracts are programs that execute transactions automatically when set conditions are met. By moving these core pieces to other teams, Cardano is pushing its development process closer to the decentralization model it has long promoted for its protocol and governance.

Who is taking over Cardano infrastructure

Input Output named Se7en Labs and Teragone among the outside firms involved in the handoff. Se7en Labs is described as a development agency with experience in Solana infrastructure, while Teragone is a cryptographic research team already leading work on Mithril, Cardano’s stake-based signature protocol.

The plan also calls for at least three independent versions of Cardano node software to run in parallel, built in Haskell, Rust, and Go. Community organizations Intersect and Pragma will oversee that work, according to Input Output.

Cardano’s engineering site describes the new direction with the phrase, “Built by many, owned by all.” Cardano founder Charles Hoskinson called the handoff the final stage of the Voltaire era, the network’s governance and decentralization phase. In Input Output’s announcement, Hoskinson said, “Our partners are ready, and the ecosystem now has many diverse options.”

Hard fork arrives this weekend

The development shift comes just before Cardano’s Van Rossem hard fork is scheduled to activate on mainnet on July 18 at 21:44 UTC. A hard fork is a blockchain software change that is not backward-compatible, meaning participants need to accept the new rules for the upgraded chain to function as intended.

Intersect said the upgrade was ratified on July 13 with 77.63% support from delegated community representatives. Delegated representatives, often called DReps in blockchain governance, vote on behalf of token holders who delegate voting power to them.

The Van Rossem upgrade will move Cardano to Protocol Version 11. It adds new Plutus built-in functions that are meant to lower smart contract execution costs, according to the announcement. In plain terms, execution costs are the computing fees tied to running smart-contract activity on the network.

ADA price and market positioning

ADA traded near $0.165 on Friday, up about 2% on the day, with a market capitalization around $6 billion, according to the market data cited in the announcement. The token remains nearly 95% below its 2021 all-time high.

ADA futures open interest was around $193 million, according to Coinalyze data cited by the announcement. Open interest measures the value of outstanding futures contracts that have not been settled. The cited long-to-short ratio was 2.84, indicating more traders were positioned for upside than downside at that point.

Input Output said it will shift attention toward research and new ventures through IO Labs and IO Ventures after the handoff. The next test for Cardano is whether a broader engineering model can keep core development moving while the network adds new governance and smart-contract features.

This story draws on original reporting from Decrypt.