Tezos Grants $37 Million to Ecosystem Developers

The Tezos Foundation released its second Biannual Report, detailing the group’s progress in Q3 and Q4 of 2019. Published on March 19, the report reveals that the foundation owns $635 million in assets — much more than the $232 million raised in its infamous initial coin offering.

When asked how the foundation was able to achieve such a warchest, the company’s CFO, Roman Schnider, revealed to Cointelegraph that the project benefited from positive crypto market dynamics. He said:

“The increase is largely due to the appreciation of our blockchain assets over the last three years, BTC and XTZ in particular.”

The report focuses on the foundation’s usage of its funds, revealing that it offered more than $37.6 million in grant funding for the Tezos (XTZ) ecosystem since August 2019.

The grants are divided into three main categories, consisting of research and development efforts, ecosystem projects, and community support. Anyone applying for a grant must pass a complex four-step process, where the proposal is evaluated by several committees and undergoes due diligence reviews. The process is managed entirely within the Tezos Foundation, which approved 78 grants out of more than 200.

Notable grants in late 2019

Though the foundation does not disclose the specific funding amounts awarded to each project, the report notes that payments are subject to the completion of specific milestones.

Research efforts are currently heavily focused toward Tezos’ smart contract languages. Organizations such as Blockmatic, Buidl Labs, Kyoto University, The Marigold Project, and others, were all funded for developing Tezos’ smart contract languages. Other grants were awarded to Cryptium Labs, DaiLambda, and Nomadic Labs for their work on Tezos core software, including staking, privacy, and performance enhancements.

More than 40 organizations received grants for developing ecosystem tools and applications. This includes several implementations of Tezos block explorers, and staking tools developed by separate companies.

Grants were also given to Tezsure, an insurance platform based on Tezos, and camlCase, a company working on bringing decentralized finance to Tezos.

Some $13 million were also awarded to local Tezos communities across the globe. Most of them are engaged in spreading awareness of the project by organizing meetups and hackathons. Communities providing educational material are also being financially supported.

Plenty of reserves

As Cointelegraph previously reported, one of the major purported drivers of Tezos’ popularity is its foundation’s war chest.

By contrast, the Ethereum Foundation’s (EF) wallet currently holds $85 million worth of ETH. This approximately matches the figure the foundation disclosed in May 2019 as part of a $30 million funding commitment.

Though EF reports fiat reserves as well, two more funding rounds of that magnitude would consume the majority of its available capital — while Tezos could continue funding projects at a similar rate for at least seven years.