Matter Labs, the development company behind zkSync, announced layoffs on Tuesday and said it will shift the entire organization toward Prividium, an institutional-grade on-chain privacy infrastructure platform. CEO Alex Gluchowski described the move on X as a skills restructuring rather than a cost-cutting measure. The company did not disclose how many roles were affected by the layoffs.
Prividium is aimed at regulated financial institutions
According to Gluchowski, the product Matter Labs has been building for regulated financial institutions since 2024 has evolved into Prividium. The platform is designed for regulated entities such as banks and asset management firms, with the goal of offering on-chain infrastructure that combines transaction confidentiality with compliance audit capabilities.
Gluchowski said the transition came from specific product feedback from institutional clients. In practical terms, Matter Labs is reallocating its organizational focus toward Prividium and placing institutional privacy, confidential on-chain transactions, and compliance audit functionality at the center of the product direction. His comments framed the move as a restructuring of skills and priorities, not as a simple reduction in spending.
Layer 2 teams face pressure to define defensible verticals
The shift also reflects a broader trend in the Layer 2 market. Earlier, ZK and L2 projects including Hyli and Botanix had shut down, while general-purpose horizontal platforms have faced pressure to find defensible vertical areas. Matter Labs’ positioning of Prividium as institutional-grade on-chain privacy infrastructure marks a clearer reorientation of its business focus within that environment.
CoinGecko data showed that the zkSync token had a market capitalization of about $115 million and had risen 4.3% over the past 24 hours. As of publication, Matter Labs had not made any statement on the future of the zkSync network or the ZK token.