Foundry Lays Off 60% of Staff Amid Strategic Shift, DCG Continues with New Ventures

Foundry, a major mining pool and part of Digital Currency Group (DCG), recently laid off 60% of its staff. This decision primarily affected non-core functions, including the entire hardware team. There’s also talk about possibly selling off some mining site operations.

Despite these cuts, DCG’s founder, Barry Silbert, is moving forward with new projects. Just last week, he launched the Yuma AI Ecosystem Accelerator.

According to anonymous sources who spoke with Blockspace, Foundry confirmed the layoffs in a statement. They said, “We recently made the strategic decision to focus Foundry on our core business while supporting the development of DCG’s newest subsidiaries. As part of this realignment, we made the difficult decision to reduce Foundry’s workforce, resulting in layoffs across multiple teams.”

This mention of DCG’s other subsidiaries is significant. Not all of them are facing the same challenges. Silbert’s announcement about Yuma shows that some parts of DCG are thriving.

However, DCG has had its share of troubles. Over a year ago, the crypto lender Genesis filed a lawsuit against DCG over unpaid loans. At that time, DCG also sold CoinDesk, a well-known crypto media outlet. Now, it seems Foundry is experiencing similar issues.

Earlier in August, Foundry established itself as one of the largest Bitcoin miners, alongside AntPool. Together, they controlled more than half of the global hash rate. Yet, Bitcoin mining has become more difficult this year, especially after the halving, leading to lower profits for mining companies.

The layoffs primarily targeted non-core employees. Out of an initial team of 250, about 20 were reassigned to Yuma, while between 160 and 170 were let go. This included the entire ASIC repair and hardware teams, but the mining pool operations are still intact. Foundry is also considering selling its site operations team, which manages Bitcoin mining locations.

It’s tough to gauge Foundry’s overall health due to how secretive the company has been about these layoffs. For instance, DCG’s Q3 2024 shareholder letter claimed Foundry was on track to earn $80 million in revenue, yet the layoffs still happened. The future of the world’s largest Bitcoin mining pool remains uncertain.