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Decipher Developer Grants

for developing decentralized applications on the blockchain

1. Overview

1. 1. Introduction


Figure 1: Grant Programs

On May 25th, 2021, Dfinity launched the DFINITY Developer Grant Program and as of September 29th, 2021, the program has committed a cumulative total of $1,145,000 in developer grants, with individual grants ranging from $5,000 to $25,000. These grants are used to fund projects that can potentially promote diversity and drive faster development of the software ecosystem of the Internet Computer.

As defined in Cambridge Dictionary, the development grants are

money given by a government or other organization to create a business or to help a business grow, especially in an area with a lot of unemployed people.

For developers, these grant programs are a wonderful opportunity to realize their ideas, which can support projects that are innovative but lack the funds to keep progressing.

For companies, nowadays, it is becoming more difficult to boost their technology on a large scale just by relying on their own R&D power. Thanks to the convenience of the Internet, massive technology-based companies or entities such as DFINITY are growing their ecological clusters with the power of external developers. The developer grant is one of the key channels through which these technology entities fund external developers.

1.2. Motivation

The motivation for a company or entity to distribute developer grants is straightforward.

First, the companies want to catalyze the expansion of their software ecology. New platforms and software ecosystems often require a continuous and substantial infusion of new blood to sustain and grow, especially in the face of intense competition among existing major platforms. This is one of the reasons why there are more developer grants projects on blockchain application platforms such as the Ethereum and the Internet Computer. Moreover, these grant programs also make the emerging blockchain companies competitive in the face of the huge ecological system of the traditional centralized Internet.


Figure 2: Developer Community

Second, there is a demand to collect ideas from external communities. It is often difficult for platform maintainers to ensure that the software ecology is all-inclusive, in other words, the homogeneity within the platform might emerge. The developer community, however, is extremely diverse. Grant programs encourage the developer community to input various ideas into the ecosystem. The diversity of these ideas greatly complements the shortcoming of homogeneity within the ecosystem.

2. Popular Developer Grant Programs

There are currently a very large number of developer grant programs on the Internet, particularly in the area of decentralized finance (DeFi). There is a handy website for browsing grants in the DeFi area: https://www.defigrants.org/. In this section, we list a few popular developer grant programs for illustration and comparison.

2.1. DFINITY Developer Grant Program


Figure 3: DFINITY Developer Grant Program

DFINITY is an NPO focused on developing technology for the Internet Computer blockchain. The DFINITY Developer Grant Program aims to leverage the power of the developer community to rapidly expand the Internet Computer ecosystem and accelerate the technology iteration.

Company/Organization: DFINITY

Area: Blockchain

Topics Available: Canister Development Kits (CDKs) and Agents, Developer Tooling (e.g. chat, email, maps), Infrastructure (e.g. oracles, asset bridges), Integrations & APIs (e.g. chat, email, maps), Apps & Open Internet Services

Amount of Grant: $5000, $25000, $100000

Information required for application:

  • Team information: including location, size, and information for the organization if applicable.
  • Project information: the topic of the project, short description including the overview, the goal, how the project will be completed, potential barriers and dependencies, and how will the grant be utilized, and supportive files for your project, like mockups, designs, and videos.
  • Grant size
  • Project roadmap & Milestones: number of milestones depends on the size of the grant.
  • Benefits: benefits that the project will bring to the Internet Computer ecosystem, and the contribution it will make to the community.

2.2. Binance Smart Chain Accelerator


Figure 4: Binance Smart Chain Accelerator

Binance is one of the world’s largest online trading platforms for cryptocurrencies. The Binance Smart Chain Accelerator Fund program aims to accelerate the technical development of the platform by engaging the power of external developers.

Company/Organization: Binance

Topics Available: DEXes, Liquidity Aggregators, Derivatives, Yield, Management, Wallets, Interoperability, Cross-chain Assets

Amount of Grant: Not provided, $100,000,000 in total.

Information required for application:

  • Team information: contact or email of project founders.
  • Project information: basic information including name, project website and Twitter URL and number of active users, a short description of the project, current development progress of the project.
  • Project Deck
  • Funding Expectation: expected allocation of funds

2.3. Epic MegaGrants


Figure 5: Epic MegaGrants

Epic Games is a company that provides single-player and online game platforms and is also the provider of Unreal Engine. Epic MegaGrants encourages developers to utilize their Unreal Engine for content creation.

Company/Organization: Epic Games

Topics Available: Game, Enterprise, Media & Entertainment, Education, Tools, and Open Source

Amount of Grant: Determined by applicant

Information required for application:

  • Project Information: project name, project website, project demo, project type or categories, target platforms, and description of your project
  • Development plan: current progress of the project development, plan for the next step
  • Funding information: the amount of funding you’re requesting, and plan to use the funds (if over $25,000)
  • Hardware Request: any hardware support needed to continue the development

2.4. Ethereum Ecosystem Support Program


Figure 6: Ethereum Ethereum Ecosystem Support Program

Ethereum is currently one of the hottest blockchains integrated with smart contracts functionality. There are a large number of dApps running on Ethereum. The Ethereum Ecosystem Support Program focuses on supporting projects that contribute to the growth of the ecosystem and benefit Ethereum.

Company/Organization: Ethereum

Topics Available: Game, Enterprise, Media & Entertainment, Education, Tools, and Open Source

Amount of Grant: Determined by applicant

Information required for application:

  • Project information: project name and a brief description
  • Team information: team profile including bios of members, previous work
  • Benefits: Expectation of how will the project contribute to the Ethereum ecosystem, who will benefit from your project, the problem your problem address
  • Request for Support: significant obstacles of your project, most pressing needs

2.5. Gnosis Ecosystem Fund


Figure 7: Gnosis Ecosystem Fund

Gnosis is a toolchain that allows you to create, trade, and hold digital assets on Ethereum. The Gnosis Ecosystem Fund encourages developers to use Gnosis products to develop products that will enrich the Ethereum ecosystem.

Company/Organization: Gnosis

Topics Available: Product based on Gnosis’ platform or product, prediction markets/Futarchy, Market mechanism, Governance, Dapp useability, Dapp scalability

Amount of Grant: $5,000 to $100,000

Information required for application:

  • Project Information: project description, targeted problems to be solved, project goal, technical description
  • Development Plan: milestones, overall time frame
  • Team Information: your programming portfolio, a brief description of your team, other sources of funding you applied (if applicable)
  • Funding Information: the number of funds to request

From the application materials released by major grant programs, it appears that they have similar general requirements for candidate projects, with some special requirements based on the characteristics of the organization.

Explicit selectable topics

Most grant programs have clear restrictions on the topics of the projects. In general, projects submitted must be related to the use of the organization’s products or expand the ecosystem of the organization’s platform.

Requirements for project completion

Some grant programs do not accept projects that have not yet been started, especially from large volume companies such as Epic Games. These companies or organizations have a more mature software ecosystem and documentation to help developers achieve semi-finished products more quickly so that the organization can better assess the potential value of the project.

Project and funding plan

The plan for project development is a basic requirement. The various stages of development and the expected outcomes need to be defined before the application is submitted. If the amount of funding requested is large, a breakdown of the allocation of funds needs to be specified.

Biographical information and project experience

Generally, large projects place more emphasis on the developer’s project experience. Due to the large number of applicants, large volume companies need to screen for more promising projects by ranking personal experience. Therefore, beginner developers can focus on applying for grants offered by small-volume entities.

3. How to select your grant project

This section gives a brief introduction to a rough process of selecting the most suitable developer grant program. Figure 8 gives a flowchart for this process.


Figure 8: Process of selecting grant program

3.1. Project Experience

The first thing to consider is your and your team’s project experience. As mentioned before, large programs sometimes use previous project experiences as an indicator to screen candidates. Beginners need to be prepared to be rejected when applying to large grant programs and can gain experience by applying to many smaller grants first.

3.2. Platform

The choice of platform is always one of the ultimate factors in choosing a grant project. Software developers often only fund developers who use their software. For example, DFINITY only funds developers who develop on the Internet Computer; Epic Games only sponsors. Therefore, before choosing a grant program, be sure to check in advance the software and platform offered by the company you are interested in, vice versa.

3.3. Filter Grants by Project Topics

If you don’t have a project idea yet, it is recommended for you to draft a project proposal by first looking up organizations or platforms that interest you, based on the topics of projects they offer. If you already have a project idea or are working on some projects, you can find a sponsor by searching whether the provider of tools and platforms you are using has a grant program, or if other organizations sponsor the type of project you are working on.

3.4. Draft the Application

Next, you need to draft a grant application. Depending on the grant program you have chosen, the materials required for the application varies. You can find detailed information in the explanatory materials provided by the grant organization. However, these materials generally include team information, project information, development schedule and plans, details of how funds will be used, etc.

3.5. Submit

Now, you can submit all the information you have prepared and wait for the good news.

4. Hackathon

In addition to the traditional grant programs, there is a more specific and popular method of obtaining development funding — the Hackathon. Hackathon is a type of event that brings together a large number of people to form groups and engage in computer programming, and the goal of a Hackathon is to create some software or hardware with specific functions at the end of the event.

The hackathon is divided into two forms: offline and online. With the development of the Internet, online hackathons are becoming more and more popular. There are thousands of hackathon projects to choose from. Here is a handy website for searching for ongoing hackathon projects https://devpost.com/hackathons


Figure 9: Devpost — Hackathon

On this website, you’re able to easily filter the proper hackathon projects by time, location, number of prizes, and even some topic tags.

4.1. Example

Here we will provide an example hackathon project to explain the general pattern of a hackathon project.

Project Name: Celo’s Make Crypto Mobile Hackathon

Link: https://mobiledefi.devpost.com/?ref_feature=challenge&ref_medium=discover

Project Requirements


Figure 10: Project Requirement

Compared to other developer grant programs, the hackathon has more detailed requirements for the submitted work. Figure 10 shows the requirements for this project. Similar to the developer grant, the hackathon sponsors require participants to use a specific platform to complete their work. In addition, there are more detailed and strict requirements for the functionality of the work.

4.2. Agenda


Figure 11: Hackathon Agenda

Typically, hackathon organizers will provide a detailed schedule. The events on the schedule are more flexible and may include some tutorials on the use of the platform or software, presentations by sponsors, or project submissions. It is important to read through the schedule carefully.

4.3. Prizes


Figure 12: Prize List

Of course, you can also check out the various awards and prizes offered by the hackathon.

Besides, the hackathon is a great starting point for applying for funding. One of the big reasons we recommend hackathons is that it is not as cumbersome to apply for as a traditional grant program. It not only improves your skills but also enriches your project experience and helps you apply for subsequent grant programs.

5. Conclusion

Developer grant programs are really good opportunities for developers to realize their dream ideas. Although your application might fail, the process of finding and applying for grant programs can still give you a chance to explore different companies or organizations. This article gives you an overview of the definition, motivation, and methodology for choosing developer grant programs, but only a brief one. You definitely need to research more by yourself before applying for a program. In addition, we introduce a type of program that is more suitable for novice starters — hackathon, which can help you quickly accumulate project experience and improve your programming skill. Anyway, developer grants and hackathons are always an excellent chance for you to understand more about the developer’s world, just go for it!

About the Author


Figure 13: Zesen Zhuang

Zesen Zhuang is the Chair of Technology Development of SciEcon, as well as a junior student at Duke Kunshan University majoring in Data Science. He has a solid foundation in Computer Science and excels in Data Science courses. His areas of interest include reinforcement learning and algorithmic trading, and the metaverse. He is working under the guidance of Prof. Luyao Zhang on the combined application of algorithmic trading and reinforcement learning, and the application of decentralization in education. He is also involved in several projects at SciEcon CIC, for which he provides core technical support.

Acknowledgments:

Executive Editor: Xinyu Tian

Supervisor and Chief Editor: Prof. Luyao Zhang

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