A lively discussion has emerged in recent days about why Cardano was left off the list of 87 cryptocurrency partners of Mastercard. Researcher Thomas Bush mapped the entire card partner ecosystem and found that Aptos, Avalanche, Polygon, Solana, and Ripple are included, but Cardano is missing.

Many members of the ADA community wondered what was going on. One token holder directly asked whether projects like Cardano focus too much on building technology and neglect practical integrations with the real world. This is a valid observation — despite years of development, the network somehow hasn't made it into this group.

Charles Hoskinson, the founder of Cardano, decided to clarify the situation. His response was quite honest: the problem is the structure. Cardano simply does not have a dedicated organization that handles partnerships and integrations on an ongoing basis. Charles Hoskinson pointed to Midnight as an example, where the foundation actively works on the ecosystem and partnerships every day.

Previously, there was a group called Pentad that handled integrations, but that was a one-time effort. Hoskinson emphasized that this must be an ongoing activity, not episodic projects. If Cardano wants to secure more major partnerships, it needs a dedicated, permanent team for this mission.

Overall, Charles Hoskinson highlights something obvious — without a systematic approach to integrations, it will be difficult to compete with projects that have this planned. It’s a lesson for the entire ecosystem that technology is one thing, but business is another.

ADA is currently trading at $0.24, down 1.38 percent over the past 24 hours.