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The team behind Ethereum-based token Omnitude (ECOM) has announced that the project is shutting down indefinitely due to funding difficulties. The token’s price reacted immediately, plummeting over 80%—in just a few hours ECOM dropped from $0.028 to $0.004, according to Messari.
“The funding has been delayed even further, with current timelines looking like 3+ months away. [...] I feel like we have been seriously and continuously mislead for the past year by the funding [...] We have no choice now but to cease operations,” the announcement in Omnitude’s official Telegram channel reads.
According to the statement, Omnitude’s development will be resumed only if the team is able to secure further funding. The situation is also worsened by the fact that “signed contracts and constant assurances” reportedly prevented the team from making any “alternative arrangements.”
For the time being, Omnitude’s developers will cease all operations and have “no choice but to seek other employment.”
“Over the past few months we’ve explored hundreds of other avenues to try and avoid this, but currently there isn’t any investment appetite for blockchain,” the announcement concluded.
Indeed, despite the recent short-term thaw on crypto markets, the industry as a whole still remains in a state of uncertainty and “crypto winter,” and many companies in the sector are getting frostbitten.
As Decrypt reported not too long ago, Bitmain, the Beijing-based producer of Bitcoin mining machines, is cutting its workforce. This comes just five months ahead of Bitcoin’s “halvening,” expected to occur in mid-May.
In another example, Berlin-based blockchain development studio Lightcurve has laid off 40% of its employees in mid-December last year.
Shortly before that, blockchain payments firm Circle announced a new round of layoffs—following a previous round back in May—firing “about 10” employees. And it looks like this growing trend will continue unless the prices finally pick up.