David Walsh
Co-founder
Built the Ethereum Foundation's Enterprise function, engaging hundreds of institutions. Over five years advancing institutional Ethereum; ex-EY Financial Services.
Who we are.
The company, the founders who built the Ethereum Foundation's enterprise function, and the team you would work with.
The company.
Ethereum lacks a neutral, institutional front door.
Across the ecosystem, most actors are either focused on protocol R&D or advancing their own commercial solutions. What has been missing is a credible, independent counterpart that institutions can engage with directly, one that represents the full Ethereum ecosystem without bias.
Ethereum Institutional is an independent non-profit dedicated to accelerating the institutional adoption of Ethereum, its L2s, applications and overall ecosystem.
Founded in 2026 with anchor funding from BitMine, SharpLink, Joseph Lubin and Mihai Alisie, our role is to translate institutional requirements into credible onchain deployments, while ensuring institutions can navigate Ethereum with clarity and confidence.
Through our events, we bring leading institutions and Ethereum ecosystem stakeholders together on neutral ground to set priorities, address challenges, and coordinate solutions that drive new deployments on Ethereum.
By aligning technical roadmaps with real-world use cases, surfacing demand from institutional participants, and amplifying what works, we accelerate adoption and help shape a more coherent market structure.
Our goal is simple: to make Ethereum the foundational layer for institutional finance.
The founders.
Each came from the Ethereum Foundation's enterprise team or from institutional finance. That experience is why the organization exists.
Marius Smith
Co-founder
Five years scaling one of Europe's first regulated crypto custody and infrastructure firms. Previously Eigen Labs, N26 and Google.
Matthew Dawson
Co-founder
The Ethereum Foundation's first enterprise lead, with seven years across digital assets and traditional finance. Previously Accenture.
The team.
The people you will work with.
Benjamin Chodroff
Head of Technical Strategy and MENA
Benjamin brings 20+ years at the intersection of finance and emerging technology, most recently leading institutional finance sales for MENA and APAC at OpenZeppelin and before that seven years at HSBC, where he headed the bank's emerging technology lab.
Kevin Leuthardt
Fractional Head of Finance
Kevin brings expertise across finance, tax and digital assets, having served as CFO at Arweave, Head of Finance at Safe and interim Head of Finance at WalletConnect, following earlier tax advisory work at KPMG Switzerland.
Mia Adriaens
Events Lead
Mia brings experience leading global events across the Ethereum ecosystem, previously heading events at Symbiotic, where she helped deliver more than 40 events worldwide, and before that running the Staking Summit at Staking Rewards.
Marius du Toit
Product and Design Lead
Marius brings award-winning expertise across brand, product and user experience design, having led design for Staking Rewards and Staking Summit, alongside work with Looping Collective. Based in South Africa, combining a background in visual identity with digital product design.
Join the team.
We are hiring for these roles.