The Journey of Dankrad Feist: From Physics PhD to Blockchain Pioneer

On October 17, 2025, a tweet rocked the Ethereum community: Dankrad Feist, a luminary in Ethereum research, announced he would be leaving the Ethereum Foundation to join Tempo, a blockchain company poised to revolutionize payments. The news reverberated through the crypto space, earning a personal nod from Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, who praised Feist’s extensive contributions—ranging from the concepts of Danksharding to essential consensus research.

Who is Dankrad Feist?

Dankrad Feist is more than a name; he is a transformative figure in the evolving landscape of blockchain technology. His background isn’t steeped in traditional cryptocurrency enthusiasm. Born in Germany, Feist initially immersed himself in academia, earning a PhD in theoretical physics from the University of Cambridge in 2013. His focus on skyrmions—a complex mathematical model used to describe atomic interactions—highlighted his profound analytical skills, laying the groundwork for future innovations in cryptography.

Interestingly, during his academic journey, Feist found a "casual" fascination with Bitcoin around 2013, the year when Bitcoin started making waves beyond the nerd circles. This marked the beginning of a long, transformative journey that would ultimately lead him to the forefront of blockchain technology.

From Scholar to Entrepreneur

Upon completing his doctorate, Feist’s trajectory veered away from academia. In 2016, he co-founded Cara Care, a health tech startup aimed at personalized digestive health solutions. However, as his engagement with cryptocurrency deepened, he began to recognize the vital role that his math and physics background could play in solving blockchain’s most pressing challenges—like consensus mechanisms and cryptographic proofs.

A Key Player in Ethereum’s Development

Feist officially joined the Ethereum Foundation in 2018, initially as a part-time researcher and transitioning to a full-time role in 2019. His presence quickly became transformative, aligning his skills with Ethereum’s growing need for advanced scaling solutions. At the Foundation, he delved into applied cryptography, multi-party computation (MPC), and zero-knowledge proofs—essential components for Ethereum’s scalability initiatives.

Introduction of "Danksharding"

Feist’s most notable contribution is "Danksharding," a sharding design that aims to improve Ethereum’s data availability through an innovative MPC-friendly proof-of-custody protocol. Sharding, at its core, divides blockchain data into smaller segments, enabling multiple nodes to process different data blocks simultaneously. What sets Feist’s work apart is his development of a Data Availability Sampling (DAS) mechanism. This allows the Ethereum network to verify necessary data availability even within a sharded environment, fundamentally strengthening its scalability.

His work paved the way for Ethereum Improvement Proposal (EIP) 4844, known as "proto-danksharding," marking a milestone in Ethereum’s path toward full sharding capabilities.

EIP-9698: Visionary or Overambitious?

Feist’s intellectual boldness became even more apparent with EIP-9698, proposed in April 2025, which aimed for a staggering 100-fold increase in Ethereum’s gas limit over four years. If adopted, Ethereum could potentially process 2,000 transactions per second—a significant leap forward, putting it on par with high-performance blockchains like Solana. In the face of mixed reactions within the community, Feist defended his proposal, advocating for gradual increases while offering node operators the time to adapt.

Technical Contributions Beyond Sharding

Feist’s contributions extend far beyond his sharding innovations. He played a crucial role in Stateless Ethereum, promoting Verkle trees—an advanced cryptographic data structure that enhances the capability for nodes to verify transactions without retaining the entire blockchain state. This approach effectively lowers the hardware demands for running Ethereum nodes.

Moreover, his expertise in zero-knowledge proofs has influenced various Layer 2 solutions including Optimism and Arbitrum. His work on an MPC-friendly data custody proof protocol addresses critical challenges in sharding, ensuring that validators can cryptographically prove their custody of shard data, crucial for Ethereum’s long-term scalability.

Why the Move: A Career Transition

On October 17, as he announced his move to Tempo, Feist expressed excitement about the new opportunities that lay ahead in the crypto industry. In his statement, he emphasized the importance of connecting blockchain technology to the real-world applications that could benefit everyday people globally. This pivot to Tempo represents not just a career shift but a chance to focus on a burgeoning area of the blockchain space—payments.

Feist clarified that his departure from the Ethereum Foundation is not a farewell. He intends to remain involved as a research advisor, continuing contributions towards Ethereum’s scaling frameworks and user experience.

The Pay Paradox: Nonprofit vs. Private Sector

Amid the technical aspirations, a significant backdrop to Feist’s departure is the crucial issue of compensation. A recent survey indicated that the median salary for Ethereum core developers remains relatively low—only $140,000, with a scant 37% receiving equity or token compensation. This stands in stark contrast to potential earnings in private sector blockchain projects.

Just days before Feist’s announcement, another Ethereum core developer publicly disclosed earning just $625,000 over six years, a period during which Ethereum’s market valuation surged dramatically. In stark comparison, firms like Coinbase offer competitive packages significantly higher than those at nonprofit organizations like the Ethereum Foundation.

This financial reality suggests that Feist’s move to Tempo—backed by significant funding—could be driven by a desire for better financial compensation amid rising corporate investments in blockchain talent.

Tempo: A New Era for Blockchain Payments

So what is Tempo? This ambitious project, incubated in collaboration with payment giant Stripe and crypto investment fund Paradigm, aims to build a blockchain specifically optimized for payments. Having recently completed a $500 million Series A funding round at a striking $5 billion valuation, Tempo aspires to handle over 100,000 transactions per second with confirmation times under one second.

Tempo’s strategic innovations, such as enabling stablecoin payments for transaction fees and supporting corporate reconciliation via ISO 20022 standard transaction notes, set it apart as a forward-thinking, specialized blockchain project.

Feist’s journey from theoretical physics to blockchain entrepreneurship reflects not just his individual evolution but also parallels the broader maturation of the blockchain industry—from early proof of concepts to large-scale implementations aimed at real-world applications.