Key Takeaways:
- Three Sonic Labs board members including Andre Cronje resigned on June 19
- S token fell 5% to $0.031, down 97% from its January 2025 peak
- New CEO Matt Visser pledged to make Sonic 1% better daily
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Sonic Labs board exits as S token drops 5% amid leadership overhaul
Sonic's S token fell 5% to $0.031 after three founding board members, including Andre Cronje, resigned from Sonic Labs.
"I am not here to promise an instant turnaround. I am here to make Sonic 1% better every single day and let that compound," Matt Visser, the newly appointed chief executive officer of Sonic Labs, said.
The S token has fallen roughly 97% from its January 2025 record of $1.03, according to CoinGecko data. Total value locked on Sonic stood at about $20 million, down some 98% from a peak of $1.14 billion in May 2025, per DefiLlama.
The departures complete a leadership unwind that began in late 2025, when the Fantom Foundation rebranded to Sonic Labs. Former CEO Mitchell Demeter and business head Evan Owens resigned in February 2026, after which the board took over operations directly. Visser and Kosta Kourkoumelis, appointed as chief operating officer, now replace that board-led structure.
The company said on June 19 that Michael Kong, David Richardson and Cronje were stepping down from the board. They "remain invested in Sonic's success" and "will no longer make business decisions for the organization," Sonic Labs said.
Sonic Labs, the research and development organization behind the Sonic EVM-compatible layer-1 blockchain, is the successor to the Fantom Foundation, which was founded in 2018. The blockchain claims to provide 10,000 transactions per second and subsecond finality.
The company laid out four commitments: publishing decisions with reasoning, creating a dedicated risk and compliance committee, treating S holders as stakeholders, and cutting back on announcements in favor of plainer updates. It said it would be judged as a team over the next 100 days.
Cronje remains tied to the ecosystem through Flying Tulip, the DeFi exchange he is building on Sonic, which raised capital at a $1 billion valuation earlier this year even as the S token slid.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute investment advice.
