Marieke Flament, who served as the CEO of Near Foundation, the creator of the namesake layer-1 protocol, has stepped down from her position.
As announced on September 21st, Chris Donovan, the general counsel of Near Foundation, will assume the role of CEO, succeeding Flament in light of her resignation. Flament did not provide a specific rationale for her departure but did share insights about her time at the helm. She stated that she was unfamiliar with NEAR just two years ago. After conducting research and engaging in numerous discussions, it became evident that NEAR held immense potential. It boasted impressive technology, a diverse and vibrant community, and a world of boundless opportunities, which prompted her to join.
Flament revealed that from 2021 to 2023, the daily active user count of Near Protocol had surged from 50,000 to an impressive 3 million, while its Twitter followers had swelled from 200,000 to over 2 million. She also noted that they had garnered more than 2,000 pieces of media coverage during this period.
Among the notable partnerships forged by Near during this timeframe were those with SWEAT, Playember, Circle, Ledger, Alibaba, Amazon, Google, KPMG, Cosmose AI, SailGP, The Littles, PipeFlare, Shemaroo, Kakao Games, Inven/Vortex, and Netmarble/Marblex in Korea. Furthermore, Flament disclosed that the current treasury balance of the Near Foundation stands at 330 million NEAR tokens, with an estimated value of $350 million. Summing up her leadership approach,
Flament articulated by saying, “My strategy has revolved around driving mainstream adoption, facilitating and empowering grassroots communities, and advancing our journey towards decentralization. Integrating major web2 players into our ecosystem while nurturing web3 innovators has also been instrumental in our growth.”
As of now, NEAR ranks as the 40th largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, estimated at $1.04 billion. In June, Czech automobile conglomerate Škoda Auto launched a nonfungible token platform on the Near Protocol.
Image by freepik
Disclosure Statement: Miami Crypto does not take any external funding, or support to bring crypto news to the readers. We do not have any conflicts of interest while writing news stories on Miami Crypto.