Yuga Labs Acquires PROOF and Announces CEO Change Amid Otherside Metaverse Update

According to Blockworks, Yuga Labs, the company managing the two most valuable NFT collections by floor price, recently acquired PROOF, the NFT shop known for its Moonbirds profile picture collection. Shortly after the acquisition, Yuga Labs announced its second CEO change in under a year, with co-founder Greg Solano taking the position. On the same day, the company provided a progress update on its Otherside metaverse platform, which received mixed reactions from the community. Yuga Labs is known for developing the Bored Apes Yacht Club NFT collection, which gained prominence during the speculative NFT frenzy of 2021. The company also acquired the CryptoPunks collection in 2022. However, Yuga Labs has faced challenges in maintaining its status, with rival Pudgy Penguins nearly surpassing Bored Apes' price floor. In a post announcing his role as CEO, Solano stated his goal was to allow the team working on Bored Apes to operate autonomously from Yuga Labs. He also emphasized the Otherside metaverse as a potential 'living room of Web3.' General manager Eric Reid provided details on the strategy for Otherside, promising quick and public iterations by the platform's developers. However, some backlash arose from Reid's statement that Yuga wouldn't be building a competitive massive multiplayer online game, prompting him to clarify that they were expanding, not scaling back, Otherside's potential. Meanwhile, Pudgy Penguins continues to grow its intellectual property brand, announcing Pudgy toys in an additional 1,100 Walmart stores and unveiling a .pudgy top-level domain in partnership with Unstoppable Domains at NFT Paris.