Fund-raising Hack for Early Web3 Projects: Ecosystem Grants
The process of assembling a team, developing your idea, and testing project-market fit is tasking, but not compared to raising funds. Funding is the most challenging and nerve-wracking phase because investors are becoming more risk-averse (following the FTX and Alameda empire collapse).
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Additionally, funds are just as vital to your Web3 project as the problem it solves, as they influence the project’s growth. Many smart contracts and projects are launched in Web3 daily, but only a few make it past the development phase. This disparity in project success is due to a shortage of funds and unmet expectations from developers, creators, marketers, other team members, and the target audience.
To avoid the above scenario, many emerging startups must take advantage of ecosystem grants and accelerator programs before their seed investment rounds and product launches.
Seed investors expect you to have some business track record before they invest. Ecosystems have lower requirements for entry, investing, and onboarding projects — the investment minimum is also low!
In many cases, you only need your code, a business and profit model, a detailed product description, and a user acquisition strategy to apply for grants.
Note that the requirements are not rigid but vary from ecosystem to ecosystem.
Below, I’ve combined a list of (active) grant and accelerator programs across different ecosystems, so read on to find out!
Grants:
Uniswap Grants: a grant focused on the Uniswap ecosystem. Grants are up to $50,000 in ETH, with an additional $25,000 available to projects that show exceptional growth. They are awarded on a rolling basis, but applications are open all year round.
Aave Grants: is a grant for funding ideas proposed by the Aave protocol community. Aave grants provide up to $10,000 in funding, awarded on a rolling basis. The grant amount awarded depends on the project and the team behind it.
Aurora Grants: was created to help grow and board developers/projects to Aurora and, ultimately, the NEAR ecosystem. (Aurora is an EVM-compatible network on NEAR).
Web3 Foundation Grants: This grant program focuses on projects building on the Polkadot blockchain. Grants are awarded as a one-time payment ranging from $2,500 to $100,000 per project.
Startup Accelerators
a16z Crypto Startup School: Every spring, a16z hosts a twelve-week startup accelerator. They also invest $500,000 into every company that qualifies/participates in exchange for 7% equity and other rights. P.S.: Applications are closed, but you can watch the free videos from the 2020 session here: https://a16z.com/crypto-startup-school/.
Metarise accelerator partners with web3 network and protocol ecosystems to provide up to $250,000 in seed funding. The funding can come in a convertible note, cash, equity, or a combination of the three.
LongHash VC Accelerator is Asia’s first and leading web3 acceleration program. The program has a track record of 9 cohorts, over 60 projects, and $150m raised.
Adaverse is a Cardano ecosystem accelerator supported by EMURGO and Everest Ventures Group.
Catheon Gaming This is a GameFi accelerator program that supports blockchain gaming and metaverse projects with a total of $50,000 in funding for up to five eligible gaming projects. The next cohort will kick off in Q1 2023.
Grant Aggregators
Cryptoneur: Dubbed the Crunchbase for Web3 grants, Cryptoneur is a complete and up-to-date database of web3 grants with customizable filters.
Llamao Grants: is a public good that shows info on ecosystem grants across crypto. DeFi Llama launched it in 2021.
Web3grants is the largest grant aggregator I’ve seen. It includes grants from Algorand, Celo, Binance X, FTX, Polkadot, Polygon, NEAR, etc.
UseWeb3 aggregates information about grants from Compound, Aave, Chainlink, Balancer, The Graph, etc.
And that’s it!
Thank you for reading so far, and I hope you learned a strategy or two. Now you’re done reading; it’s time to start implementing. And if you run into any snags or want to talk about your project…
Drop a comment below or reach me via mail.
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