The Tezos blockchain project may finally get underway after two board members of the Tezos Foundation, including its founder and president Johann Gevers, voluntarily stepped down and were replaced by Tezos community members, according to a press release published Feb. 22.

Newly appointed Ryan Jesperson and Michel Mauny join Lars Haussmann, appointed to the board on Jan. 31, right as the foundation prepares to launch the Tezos network.

“To serve the best interests of the Tezos Project, Johann Gevers and Diego Olivier Fernandez Pons have voluntarily offered to resign from the Foundation Board. They are committed to the success of the Tezos project and will continue to support its development towards a bright future. We thank both of them for their service”, stated Jesperson in the press release.

Michel Mauny is a dedicated member of the community as well. In addition to serving on the board at Tezos, he is a senior researcher at the French science and technology institution Inria in the field of programming languages.

In July 2017, Tezos’ initial coin offering (ICO) gained extreme popularity among crypto investors excited about the project and the coin’s potential. They donated BTC and ETH in exchange for the platform’s native tokens, called “Tezzies”.

However, following the wildly successful $232 mln ICO, one of the largest ICO’s to date, a dispute arose between Arthur and Kathleen Breitman, the creators of the project who own Tezos’ intellectual property rights, and Gevers, who controlled the raised funds. This led to an indefinite delay of the platform launch and a series of lawsuits against the company.

Jesperson supported the Breitmans in their dispute with Gevers and helped form the T2 Foundation,  which intends to breath new life into the project, obtain control from the original foundation, and finally launch the Tezos network.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) declined to provide information on Tezos when it was requested by attorney David Silver via the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Silver represents plaintiffs in a lawsuit filed against the company in November, 2017.

During a conference at UCLA Feb. 17-18, Kathleen Breitman announced the platform and tokens would be launched “in the next few weeks”.

Ana Heide