In the past few months, the "top projects" in the crypto industry have been exposed one after another. The founder of the highly-watched io.net was suspected of fraud a while ago, and the parallel EVM leading project Eclipse also had problems recently. On May 8, Jiwoo Jun, a member of the AI crypto search engine Kaito, posted a tweet on the X platform, accusing Eclipse founder Neel Somani of sexual harassment, which attracted great attention in the industry.
Several crypto practitioners exposed Somani's misconduct
On April 27, Twitter user beachmojito (@wordsforgot) tweeted that Somani had committed multiple acts of sexual harassment. "I thought this was open knowledge in the industry, but it turns out not to be the case. Ladies please stay away from this 'founder'," with a picture of a message posted by Eclipse founder Neel Salami: "What are you doing tonight?"
Beachmojito followed up with a post saying that he had heard more stories after publishing the above public appeal, and then listed the following:
"Grooming multiple girls without consent is sexual assault; putting your head on a girl's lap after she says no is sexual assault; inviting a girl to your room for a business meeting is sexual assault; feeding a girl you just met is sexual assault; texting every girl you just met who you're going out with is verbal assault.
......
We are in crypto to make money, and yes, we can all be gamblers in this industry, trying to be the next millionaire. But being a founder doesn’t mean you can take advantage of others, and being funded by so-called Tier 1 investors doesn’t mean you are better than anyone else, so you can get away with doing anything to some unknown person. This doesn’t have to happen, and it shouldn’t happen. Don’t be so inhuman when you brag about changing the damn world. Karma may be late, but it is real.”
This post did not get widespread fermentation a week ago. This morning, Jiwoo Jun ( @jiwoo_jun ), a member of the AI encrypted search engine Kaito, retweeted beachmojito's post and said, "When he grabbed my waist and pulled me closer, even though I said "no" and pushed him away, I knew this would happen one day."
Jiwoo Jun's tweet also triggered many women in the crypto industry who had similar experiences to her to speak out.
Crypto user Bella retweeted Jiwoo's tweet and wrote, "He invited me and another girl to dinner and said, 'It's great that I can have dinner with beauty pageant champions and models,' even though it was supposed to be a business meeting. Besides, I have encountered many situations like hers and want to make my voice heard together. Sexual harassment is very common in this industry. But it doesn't mean you can treat people like this."
LSP capital's CMO @Mulan0x posted a message saying, "I met this guy at a cryptocurrency event two years ago. Knowing that he was building a new project after the failure of Luna, I wanted to know more. But when he kept texting me, asking if I wanted to have a drink, or asking me to go out only late at night, I knew it was not normal, so I stayed away from him. Thank you to every brave woman in this industry who dares to speak up!"
Jason Choi, co-founder of Tangent, a crypto venture capital club, retweeted Jiwoo's tweet and said, "The last time I mentioned this person's questionable business practices on Twitter, I didn't name him. I even deleted the tweet out of respect for investors and admitting that I didn't have the full story. But the industry needs to speak out about things like this. I don't want to work with you if you took an angel check from him."
From intern to celebrity crypto founder in 4 years
According to his LinkedIn page, Neel Somani majored in computer science, mathematics, and business administration at the University of California, Berkeley from 2015 to 2019, and obtained a double degree in liberal arts and science with a GPA of 4.0. After graduation, Somani immediately entered the crypto industry and worked as a software engineering intern at the then-famous privacy public chain Oasis from January to May 2019.
He then left the crypto industry and joined Airbnb as a software engineer in August 2019. A year later, he joined the well-known hedge fund Citadel as a quantitative researcher. In June 2022, Neel founded Eclipse, and in four years, he went from an intern to a star founder in the crypto industry.
It is worth noting that according to an in-depth report by the New York Times, Somani attended Terra's Hacker House in Chicago in April 2022, an event sponsored by Terraform Labs and its investors to incubate projects based on Mr. Kwon's technology. Within a few weeks, Somani received $10 million in venture capital, and his project Terranova was valued at $65 million.
One month later, Market Watch did a special profile for Neel Somani, but at this time, the algorithmic stablecoin UST in the Terra ecosystem was seriously decoupled, and Luna also collapsed. Neel Somani’s personal LinkedIn page did not mention this short career.
According to Market Watch, when Somani was still working at Citadel, he saw his friends around him "becoming very successful" in the cryptocurrency field, so he became more interested in cryptocurrency and believed that he could "make more money" in cryptocurrency than at Citadel. After Luna collapsed, Somani immediately drafted his next crypto project, which is today's Eclipse.
On March 11, Eclipse Labs announced the completion of a $50 million Series A financing, led by Placeholder and Hack VC, bringing its total funding to $65 million. This round of financing also attracted participation from investors such as Polychain Capital and Delphi Digital, as well as strategic investments from GSR and OKX Ventures, making Eclipse one of the most watched crypto projects.
As Eclipse's attention continues to rise, a month ago, a female Web3 entrepreneur left a message under Somani's LinkedIn dynamics seeking cooperation. As of now, Neel Somani has not responded to the accusations of many practitioners on the X platform, and his last tweet was a retweet about Blob.
Industry KOL support victims
Kaito founder Yu Hu retweeted Jiwoo Jun's tweet and said, "The entire Kaito family stands with you and admires your courage to speak out. This must be heard."
Manta founder victorji.eth once retweeted beachmojito's post and commented, "Previous sexual harassment in the cryptocurrency field has been completely removed from the industry, and I hope the same will happen in this case. Even if venture capital and partners have vested interests, such red flags should be blocked."
Woody, a well-known crypto KOL in Taiwan, retweeted Jiwoo Jun's post and said, "I don't know if there will be a chance to see more gossips. This situation is definitely not an isolated case in the crypto. More than one woman told me that similar things happened to her, but maybe they didn't dare to say it out loud."
Neel Salami sexual harassment incident continues to ferment.
Investor Meltem Demirors posted, "Today is the third time in less than a year that David Hoffman has bullied female founders/early employees of companies he has invested in. I've had enough. This behavior is disgusting. Using any social capital or influence to bully women is crazy."
He later updated the post to say that he was on the phone with David Hoffman to discuss the details, "mostly talking in circles. My understanding is that David's view of his actions and words is very different from the person on the receiving end."
But David Hoffman did not come forward to formally respond, and his partner, Ryan Adams, another host of Bankless, expressed support for David under multiple posts, "This is a fairly public accusation, and the way it is written may be interpreted in the worst possible way. I have worked with David for four years and have never seen evidence that he bullied women or similar behavior. Do you have evidence to prove this?" Or "Can you provide evidence so that we can understand his words and deeds for ourselves? Considering this extremely public call and its related impact, I think the evidence is appropriate."
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