Gavin Wood
Gavin Wood is a British computer scientist who co-founded Ethereum and authored the Yellow Paper — the formal technical specification of the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).
Key Contributions to Ethereum
- Joined the Ethereum founding team in early 2014, alongside Vitalik Buterin, Joseph Lubin, Jeffrey Wilcke, and others
- Authored the Yellow Paper (April 2014): the first formal specification of the EVM, defining opcodes, gas costs, state transition function, and account structure
- The Yellow Paper provided the technical foundation for all early Ethereum implementations, including Geth (Go) and the original C++ client
Post-Ethereum
After leaving the Ethereum Foundation, Wood founded:
- Parity Technologies — developed Parity Ethereum client and Substrate (a blockchain framework)
- Polkadot — a cross-chain interoperability protocol designed to connect multiple blockchains
Sources
- grokipedia-2026-ethereum-history — Wood named as co-founder; Yellow Paper authorship noted
Related concepts: ethereum | ethereum-virtual-machine | blockchain Related entities: vitalik-buterin | ethereum-foundation