Io.net’s CEO, Ahmad Shadid, announced on X [formerly Twitter] that he has stepped down from his executive position. Tory Green will be taking over the reins next.
According to Shadid, this decision is in the “best interest of the community and project.” Elaborating on the reason for his departure, he said,
“While there have been allegations regarding my past, I want to emphasize I am stepping down as CEO to allow io.net move forward without distraction and to focus on its growth and success.”
Io.net is a Solana-based DePin project whose infrastructure provides decentralized access to computing power for ML applications.
Projects in need of computation can harness the power from io.net’s network of GPUs from data centers and cerypto miners, who in turn, earn by plugging in their hardware onto the network.
Shadid intends to contribute a chunk of IO - the network’s to-be-launched token - from his personal holdings to the foundation. Chalking out the number, he said,
“To show that gratitude I will be donating 1M IO of my personal IO coins to io.net’s Internet of GPUs Foundation to help grow the ecosystem. It’s all about the IO Nation.”
While a few from the community thanked Shadid for his contributions to the project, others went on to label the executive’s departure days before the token launch on Binance as sketchy.
To questions regarding the timing of his decision and the lock-up schedule, Shadid clarified,
“I am forced to make the wisest decision for the best of the IO Nation. It's not about me anymore. It’s about all of you… I have 4 years lockup + vesting, no investor, advisor, or team member gets his monthly vested tokens before 2025/June. Relax.”
Io.net was earlier in the news when critics expressed skepticism over the number of GPUs available on the platform. Towards the end of April, the network had been attacked by users trying to imitate GPU availability in return for future rewards.
Shadid acknowledged that around 1.8 million fake GPUs tried connecting to the network, and the team right away got to identifying and blocking those devices.
Several short-term problems were created in that process. Nevertheless, the issue was resolved and the network infrastructure was back to being fully operational.
Outlining what’s in store next, the new CEO Green said,
“We are excited to launch IO on June 11th at 12:00 UTC and to continue accelerating io.net’s growth post-launch. The launch of the token ushers in a new phase of growth for the network. We remain unwavering in our mission to build the world’s largest decentralized AI compute network.”
