Cardano was founded in 2015 by Ethereum co-founder Charles Hoskinson. The development of the project is overseen and supervised by the Cardano Foundation based in Zug, Switzerland.[5][6] It is the largest cryptocurrency to use a proof-of-stake blockchain, which is seen as a greener alternative to proof-of-work protocols.[7]
The platform began development in 2015 and was launched in 2017 by Charles Hoskinson, a co-founder of Ethereum.[8][9][10] Hoskinson left Ethereum after a dispute with one of its co-founders, Vitalik Buterin; Hoskinson wanted to accept venture capital and create a for-profit entity, while Buterin wanted to keep it running as a nonprofit organization. After leaving, he co-founded IOHK, a blockchain-engineering company, whose primary business is the development of Cardano, alongside the Cardano Foundation and Emurgo.[10] The platform is named after Gerolamo Cardano, while the cryptocurrency itself is named after Ada Lovelace. The Ada sub-unit is the Lovelace; one Ada = 1,000,000 Lovelaces.[11]