Welcome to an Intersect weekly update special.

Dedicated to the Intersect budget proposal currently on-chain for DRep voting. This retrospective aims to highlight the seen and the unseen work that Intersect does. A “Why Intersect?”, you could say. What it has done, what it is doing, and what lies ahead for the Cardano ecosystem and where Intersect fits within that future.

Technical Stewardship, Incident Response & Coordination (including core Cardano repos)

The largest part of the Intersect core budget proposal covers work package 2, that shares the title above. Accounting for 18.8M/25.4M ada and almost 75% of the total ask, it is understandably the largest section in this update. The technical work is largely unseen but critical work. Stewardship of the core Cardano code, coordinating hard fork events and incident responses might not be headline grabbing work but it is also work that prevents headlines - of the negative variety.

Technical stewardship of core Cardano repos

Many of the core Cardano repositories are currently hosted on the IntersectMBO GitHub. Input Output began migrating the first 25 core repositories in December 2023, viewing Intersect as the future stewards of Cardano’s ongoing open-source development, with the migration providing a new independent home for the core code base and enable Intersect to support those members who maintain the repositories. Since then Input Output has continued to migrate more of the core repositories to Intersects stewardship as well as forwarding most technical support enquiries to Intersect.

Examples of these core repositories include:
Cardano Node | Cardano CLI | DB Sync | Cardano API | Cardano Ledger | Ouroboros Consensus | Ouroboros Network

Hard fork coordination

Chang, Plomin, and now van Rossem
On July 13, 2026 at 21:45 UTC, Cardano DReps, SPOs and Constitutional Committee members voted to ratify the van Rossem hard fork initiation action. Enactment of the hard fork will now take place on July 18, 2026 at 21:45 UTC. This is the third hard fork that Intersect has coordinated, following the Chang and Plomin hard forks in 2024 and 2025.

The Hard Fork Working Group (HFWG) operating under the Intersect Technical Steering Committee (TSC) has been responsible for overseeing this coordination. For van Rossem, this has involved large-scale coordination with regular meetings involving members from Input Output, Cardano Foundation, Midnight Foundation, Shielded, Ensurable Systems, and many more. This group has been responsible for outreach and coordination of SPOs, DApps, developers and exchanges to ensure a safe and timely execution of the hard fork. Communication teams have also been involved to ensure that the wider ecosystem is kept informed ahead of key developments. Testing has progressed for many months across multiple networks including, SanchoNet, Preview, and Preprod, before finally reaching Cardano Mainnet.

During testing for the van Roseem hard fork, progress came to a temporary impasse regarding some tooling on the Preprod network. After numerous discussions the decision was taken for Intersect to fork key ecosystem tooling repositories for Ogmios and Kupo and to host hard fork compatible versions until the original code base could be updated. This is an example of some of the “unowned processes” that Intersect sometimes takes on. The original Ogmios code base has now been made hard fork compatible ahead of Mainnet enactment but without this interim measure, hard fork progress could have been delayed by a number of weeks.

Looking ahead to Dijkstra and Leios
While ensuring that there are response teams in place for the van Rossem hard fork enactment, the Hard Fork Working Group has already shifted its focus towards the next hard fork and the Dijkstra era that will ultimately bring Ouroboros Leios to Cardano Mainnet. Intersect professional staff, supported by expert member committees, are currently facilitating conversations around trade offs between ecosystem development teams, builders, users and ada holders, as to the desired technical scope of the Dijkstra hard fork. Ensuring community concerns are raised, captured, are fairly and consistently articulated in a timely manner, and that relevant information is sign-posted and made available for all stakeholders. With a focus on managing strategic risk, technical dependencies and trade-offs.

Unlike previous hard forks, this one will also require constitutional amendments to accommodate the scale and technical nature of the changes, including new block types and parameters. Discussions have already begun with representatives from Input Output meeting with Civics, Technical Steering and Parameter committees. This constitutional element adds to an already complex process that depends on the level of coordination experience that Intersect has developed across 3 hard forks to date.

The public Leios testnet, known as the Musashi Dojo, went live on June 23, 2026 and is welcoming participants.

Incident response

Chain-partition incident of November 2025
During the November 2025 chain partition incident Intersect coordinated with Input Output, Cardano Foundation, and wider ecosystem partners in response to the rapidly developing situation. Ensuring that SPOs received timely information regarding the cause and remediation steps, including which node versions had been impacted and which had not. Part of the response was also communications, specifically countering any false information circulating in wider crypto media. This included a “facts at a glance” blog post and an analysis and resolution strategy write up on the Intersect news pages. Immediately afterwards the Chain Partition Incident Analysis Working Group was formed, working under the Technical Steering Committee and reporting to the Security Council. Their work was recorded on a dedicated GitBook space and culminated in the publication of a Preliminary Fact Finding Report on January 22, 2026.

Security Council
Intersect operates a Security Council on behalf of the ecosystem. This council is a selected set of respected SMEs from across the ecosystem, and a small list of trusted insiders from founding entities who come together and work tirelessly to validate and mitigate threats against the Cardano blockchain. The Security Council has validated and triaged tens of valid in-bound bug bounties, and exceptions from engineering teams in 2026 alone. Ensuring each is responded to, that mitigations, fixes, and patches are adequate and implemented.

SecondFi incident support
The Security Council has provided a sounding board to the technical teams and leadership at Emurgo throughout the SecondFi issues. It has provided expert advice, feedback and recommendation to auditors, rapidly tested theories, and provided recommendations on remediation steps prior to public release to ensure validity and safety to the ecosystem at large. Additionally, it has also provided feedback and recommendations on instructions and communications for suitability and clarity.

Disaster recovery scenarios

In October 2025, Mike Hornan organized a handful of SPOs on SanchoNet in order to test out the 3 disaster recovery scenarios outlined in CIP-135. Subsequently a report for scenario 2 was written and published under the Security Council. It is largely unseen work like this that pushes Cardano testnets to their limit in order to better prepare our understanding of recovery processes should the worst ever reach Mainnet. It’s quiet, yet valuable work.

Intersect as an MBO

Membership tiers and benefits

Intersect is a Members Based Organization (MBO) and currently has 3 membership tiers - Enterprise, Individual and Associate. The Intersect Members Area is the home dashboard where members can login to manage their profiles, see their achievements and participation record, gain access to exclusive member benefits (paid tiers only), and access the Intersect Virtual Hub.

Intersect currently has 29 Enterprise Members including; Anastasia Labs, Cardano Foundation, Chain App, Charli3, Claymates, Coin Ceylon, Dora Hacks, Dquadrant, Emurgo, Iagon, Input Output, Midnight Foundation, MLabs, Modus Create, Moneta/USDM, No Witness Labs, Rare Network, ServicePlan, Shielded, Sidan Labs, Snek, Socious, Storm Partners, Tangem, The Grid, Vaka Consulting, Well-Typed, West African Decentralised Alliance, Women In Move Solution.

Individual membership is the paid membership tier for individuals that allows participation in Intersect committee elections and to hold voting roles on those committees if elected. Working Groups that operate under a specific committee are open to anyone to participate and contribute but committee voting members must be paid Intersect members. Intersect committee members may also be eligible for a stipend for their services which is currently claimed via the Members Area, along with member discounts offered by some Intersect Enterprise Member partnerships and other ecosystem partners. The Virtual Hub is also accessible to all members. There are currently 713 individual members.

Associate membership is a free tier that allows individuals to experience the member area and network with fellow members before deciding if it is for them. All membership tiers have access to the Virtual Hub and can network with fellow members and participate in events held there, such as the Monthly Member Meeting event known as Intersect Connect. There are currently 5,478 associate members.

Virtual Hub

The Intersect Virtual Hub is a 24/7 always open virtual space accessible from the Intersect Members Area. It is a space where Intersect holds events, including the monthly Intersect Connect and the Annual Members Meeting, and features breakout rooms and virtual call rooms for members to network and host events, presentations, and meetings of their own.

Intersect Committees

Intersect currently supports 7 different committees, composed of 10 elected members each, and a secretary. In addition to these fully elected positions is the Intersect Steering Committee, a collective member driven governing body which oversees all standing committees and functions within Intersect. Its role is to enable collective decision making and communication flows between the Intersect Board, committees, elected community representatives, and Functional Directors. You can find more information about the individual committees, their members, meeting minutes and related working groups using the Knowledge Base links below:

• Cardano Budget Committee (CBC)
• Cardano Civics Committee (CCC)
• Growth and Marketing Committee (GMC)
• Membership and Community Committee (MCC)
• Open Source Committee (OSC)
• Cardano Product Committee (CPC)
• Technical Steering Committee (TSC)
• Intersect Steering Committee (ISC)

Intersect Committee elections

Intersect runs an election for its 7 committees each year, giving paid members the opportunity to stand for election for their chosen committee of interest, and for their fellow members to have the opportunity to decide who they feel is best to carry out the role on particular committees. Additionally, there are a limited number of positions available for community members to be elected to the Intersect Steering Committee also.

Intersect Board elections

In 2025, Intersect ran elections for the Board of Directors, expanding the community elected seats to 4, to create the first majority elected Board since Intersects inception. New elections are scheduled for later in 2026 with details to be announced shortly. The current Board members are:

• Gerard Moroney - Chair of the board of Intersect, Chief Operating Officer at IOG
• Nikhil Joshi - Chief Operating Officer at EMURGO
• Adam Rusch - Member & Secretary
• Kavinda Kariyapperuma - Member
• Rand McHenry - Member
• Mercy Fordwoo - Member

Sadly, we recently marked the passing of Steven Lupien on July 5, 2026. Steven was former Chair of the board of Intersect and Director for the Center for Blockchain & Digital Innovation for the University Of Wyoming. All members received an email notification from the Board while a wider ecosystem announcement was made via X post.

Get involved

Join the conversation by becoming an associate or a member via the Intersect Member Area, and follow us on Twitter (X) and LinkedIn to engage with fellow members, working groups, and the broader community. Public Google and Luma calendars are available to all. Committee meetings, working groups and events. Find something that takes your interest, join and participate.

Intersect budget proposal 2026

This retrospective has been written in the hope of highlighting much of the work that Intersect does, sometimes seen, sometimes unseen. The article's depth is a reflection of the amount of work that takes place below the surface and even then, not everything has been covered here. Thank you for taking the time if you have read this far, your time and consideration is very much appreciated. If you would consider voting on the Intersect proposal, you can read more on GovTool and vote on your governance platform of choice.

That’s it for this Special Update. Thank you for reading. To learn more about Intersect’s work, explore our Knowledge Base, which provides detailed information on governance structures, committees, and funding.

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