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Polygon appoints Sandeep Nailwal as CEO, signals founder-led reboot
In this role, Nailwal will focus on long-term strategy, oversee key ecosystem initiatives, and ensure that the Polygon Foundation—which supervises Polygon Labs and other entities—decisively steers the project towards exponential growth, sharper focus, and greater value delivery to the Polygon ecosystem, including users, applications, and POL stakers.
'At our beginnings, Polygon was all about bold execution and big goals. During 2021–23, we made a real effort to institutionalise the project by onboarding some amazing people as co-founders, setting up a board, and undergoing a period of intense tech research and exploration. Now, it is time to again move fast, aggressively, and with full conviction and focus,' said Sandeep Nailwal.
With Nailwal's move to the Polygon Foundation, Marc Boiron will be chief executive of Polygon Labs and will continue to guide the organisation's strategic vision and drive execution. Mudit Gupta was recently named chief technology officer, and Ryan Niedzialek—a long-time Polygon Labs executive—is now serving as chief operating officer, overseeing business development, partner enablement, and core operational functions.
Nailwal's immediate priorities include a product-first approach to rapidly launch a full-featured Agglayer, a transformative roadmap to evolve Polygon PoS into the high-throughput GigaGAS chain capable of supporting over 100,000 transactions per second for payments and real-world assets (RWAs), expansion of the Agglayer Breakout Programme, the sunset of Polygon zkEVM, and renewed engagement with market makers to reinforce support for POL and ensure liquidity across decentralised and centralised exchanges.
The company said these moves represent a clear shift from a more passive phase in Polygon's history to a focused and ambitious founder-led vision for the future.
Nailwal added, 'With a world-class team in place and the Foundation under my leadership, we are fully aligned on our strategy and what matters most—building amazing products and delivering real value to POL stakers. That starts with my plan for several key priorities: completing Agglayer to become the trustless interoperability layer of Web3, evolving Polygon PoS to dominate payments and real-world assets, and empowering our founders to launch independent, high-impact projects through the Agglayer Breakout Programme. With focused leadership, this is the moment to scale the next chapter of Polygon.'
This strategic move marks a defining moment for the Polygon ecosystem—one rooted in clarity of vision, decisive leadership, and a commitment to long-term value creation, the company said.
With Agglayer nearing full launch, Polygon PoS evolving into a leading platform for payments and RWAs, and a new wave of founder-led projects expanding the network, the Foundation is doubling down on what has always set Polygon apart: speed, innovation, and alignment with its community.
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