3 More Execs Leave Swiss Stock Exchange's $100M Blockchain Project

Publicado en by Coindesk | Publicado en

Three executives have left SDX, the blockchain-based digital asset trading venue owned by Swiss stock exchange operator SIX Group, since the year began, including two founding team members.

Ivo Sauter, SDX's head of clients and products, and Sven Roth, its chief digital officer, both left their full-time positions in January.

Roth will continue as an external advisor to SDX, a SIX spokesperson said.

Sauter and Roth helped lay the foundation of the SDX project with former CEO Martin Halblaub, who departed last summer.

"Primarily, this was because the mother company took more and more influence on SDX. I believe that with an innovation project like SDX there needs to be a bit of separation from the big mother."

These comings and goings follow the delay of the go-live date from summer 2019 to late 2020 for SDX, which has been an expensive endeavor for Zurich-based SIX. A source familiar with the project said the cost of SDX has so far reached close to $100 million.

SDX has about 50 employees, compared to 3,000 across all of SIX Group.

The goals of SDX have become "Much more for banks and only for banks," Sauter said.

Since Halblaub's departure in August 2019, SDX has been overseen by interim CEO Tomas Kindler, who was expected to take the reins.

Regarding the CEO position at SDX, there is now a short list of three candidates to take over, the spokesman said.

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