- In July last year, OpenSea cut roughly 20% of its jobs
- OpenSea will become OpenSea 2.0
- Floor prices of prominent NFTs are down 25% this year
Leading non-fungible token (NFT) platform OpenSea is bracing for yet another round of layoffs, the company's CEO Devin Finzer posted on X, as reported by Decrypt. The news outlet added that the latest large-scale layoff might affect up to 50% of OpenSea's staff.
Just dozens of employees left?
In July last year, OpenSea cut roughly 20% of its jobs, leaving it with a workforce of 230. After this latest round, as few as 100 employees might be left.
According to a spokesperson, the platform will move forward with “a flatter organizational approach.” Affected staff members will receive six months of healthcare, four months of severance pay, and an accelerated timetable for equity vesting.
NFT marketplace prepares for OpenSea 2.0
The layoffs come against the backdrop of a planned revamped marketplace launch, that of OpenSea 2.0. Users can trade and collect NFTs on it, including Bored Apes and Pudgy Penguins. Finzer posted:
We’re building a new foundation so we can innovate faster and we’ll have some experiences to share with you soon. We will change how we operate - shifting to a smaller team with a direct connection to users.
The difference between OpenSea and OpenSea 2.0 is not clear. No details about the platform's rollout timeline or planned product offerings have been shared.
The rise and fall of the niche
OpenSea was a highly successful NFT marketplace during the boom in 2021 and the first half of 2022, regularly recording billions of dollars of monthly trading volume for NFTs in that period. In January 2022, OpenSea raised $300 million at a $13.3 billion valuation for its Series C round co-led by Coatue and Paradigm.
Crypto prices began to decline in the middle of last year, with which the NFT market started losing steam as well. OpenSea even began to consider withdrawing creator royalties, a small portion of a secondary market sale that would be returned to the NFT creator.
How low can NFTs go?
In August this year, the floor prices of prominent NFTs from famous collections lost more than a quarter of their value. The floor price of an NFT is the lowest price at which one can sell it. The prices of lesser-known NFTs have fallen as well.
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