Co-Founder of Cosmos; CEO of Informal Systems & Cycles
Ethan Buchman is a computer scientist and co-founder of the Cosmos blockchain ecosystem, currently serving as CEO of Informal Systems and as a founder of Cycles — a private multilateral clearing protocol for institutional finance. Buchman co-founded Tendermint Inc. (now Ignite) and the Cosmos Network alongside Jae Kwon, playing a foundational role in designing Tendermint BFT consensus and the Inter-Blockchain Communication (IBC) protocol that enabled the "interchain" vision of a network of connected blockchains.
After his formative Cosmos work, Buchman co-founded Informal Systems — a research and engineering company focused on formal verification, IBC security, and distributed systems — and later founded Cycles, a payment protocol aimed at enabling private multilateral netting and clearing for institutional financial flows.
Cosmos Co-Founding
Cosmos was co-founded by Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman. The project introduced Tendermint BFT consensus — a partially synchronous Byzantine Fault Tolerant consensus protocol that provides fast finality and is used by the Cosmos Hub and many IBC-connected chains. The Cosmos Hub's ATOM token is the native staking and governance token of the Cosmos Hub chain; the broader Cosmos ecosystem of IBC-connected chains is not directly governed by any single entity.
IBC (Inter-Blockchain Communication Protocol) — the open standard for cross-chain asset and data transfer between Cosmos-compatible chains — was developed by the Interchain Foundation and Tendermint teams including Buchman's collaborators. It has become the dominant interoperability protocol within the Cosmos ecosystem.
Informal Systems
Informal Systems is a research and engineering company focused on formal verification methods applied to distributed systems and blockchain protocols. The company has contributed significantly to IBC security, Tendermint/CometBFT development, and formal modeling of consensus protocols. Buchman serves as CEO.
Cycles
Cycles is Buchman's newer venture focused on private multilateral clearing — a mechanism where multiple counterparties simultaneously net their obligations in a coordinated manner, reducing settlement requirements and counterparty risk. Cycles Pay is positioned as infrastructure for stablecoin receivables and payables management for institutions. Current mainnet/beta status and institutional partners should be verified from official Cycles documentation.
Current 2026 Work
As of August 2026, Buchman serves as CEO of both Informal Systems and Cycles. His focus includes Informal Systems' ongoing IBC security and formal verification research, and Cycles' development as a clearing protocol for institutional finance participants.
Key Contributions
- Cosmos Co-Founding: Co-founded the Cosmos Network and Tendermint Inc. with Jae Kwon; helped design the Tendermint BFT consensus algorithm.
- IBC Protocol: Contributed to the design and development of the Inter-Blockchain Communication protocol that enables the interchain ecosystem.
- Informal Systems: Founded a research company specializing in formal verification for distributed systems and blockchain security.
- Cycles Clearing Protocol: Founded Cycles to bring multilateral netting and clearing infrastructure to institutional crypto/stablecoin workflows.
- CometBFT Development: Informal Systems maintains CometBFT (the Tendermint consensus library), used by most Cosmos-SDK chains.
Career Timeline
Began collaboration with Jae Kwon on Tendermint consensus; academic background in biophysics and computer science.
Co-founded Tendermint Inc. and designed core Cosmos architecture; co-authored the Cosmos whitepaper.
Cosmos Hub mainnet launched; ATOM token went live.
Co-founded Informal Systems to focus on formal verification and IBC security research.
IBC protocol launched and adopted across Cosmos ecosystem; Informal Systems grew as a leading research contributor.
Founded Cycles; developed multilateral clearing protocol for institutional stablecoin flows.
Continues as CEO of Informal Systems and Cycles; advancing IBC security research and institutional clearing infrastructure.
Sources & Verification
Information last checked: August 2026
