Router Protocol, a Coinbase Ventures-backed cross-chain bridge project, will shut down all operations by Sept. 30 and burn 303,333,198 ROUTE tokens after a year of failed attempts to sell, license, or commercialize the platform. ROUTE's price collapsed roughly 50% on the news, and the team blamed thin bridging economics and capital shifting toward AI.
Router Protocol will shut down all its operations by Sept. 30 after a year of pursuing commercialization, licensing, and acquisition talks that failed to produce a sustainable business. The Coinbase Ventures-backed cross-chain infrastructure project announced the wind-down in a Friday statement on X after more than four years of development.
As part of the closure, Router plans to permanently burn 303,333,198 ROUTE tokens held in its treasury, about 30% of the token's nearly 1 billion total supply, and will work with centralized exchanges on separate delisting and withdrawal schedules.
Price collapses on the announcement
ROUTE's price collapsed roughly 50% following the announcement, cratering to an all-time low near $0.00004. According to the team: "Bridging economics are thin, compressing fees against costs that never sleep." Router said capital shifting from crypto into artificial intelligence and lower fees for moving assets between blockchains had cut demand for its services.
From Layer 1 launch to closure
Router raised $4.1 million in 2021 from investors including Coinbase Ventures and Polygon, then launched its own Layer 1 blockchain, Router Chain, in July 2024. The team had already moved to wind down that standalone chain in September 2025, citing infrastructure costs and validator inflation. According to The Block, all protocol fees had gone toward ROUTE buybacks and burns rather than accumulating in a treasury reserve; Crypto Briefing added that this left no financial cushion to fall back on once conditions deteriorated.
The team also disclosed two security incidents from 2025: it recovered 80% of the value from a February exploit through negotiations, but funds lost in a separate chain-level exploit that July were not recovered. Router said it plans to open-source select components of its technology so the engineering remains available to other builders.
Bridging sector under pressure
Other cross-chain infrastructure developers have faced similar pressure. Ethereum infrastructure provider Syndicate Labs announced its closure in May, citing a shrinking rollup market, while Bitcoin Layer 2 developer Botanix followed suit in June, saying transaction demand could not support its network's costs. Competitors including LayerZero, Across, Axelar, and deBridge continue to operate, and the underlying need to move assets between blockchains has not disappeared.
Sources: The Block, Crypto Briefing
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