1,300+ New Tezos Developers Trained in 2019
In the Fall of 2018, the Tezos Foundation announced that it committed funding to train 1,000 new Tezos developers by the end of 2019. In early September of this year, we checked in on the progress towards that goal and found that 842 developers had been trained. With 2019 nearly over, we wanted to see where the initiative stands: to date, Foundation-funded entities and programs trained over 1,000 developers in 2019.
Specifically, we found that 1,338 developers have completed, or are in the midst of completing, a Tezos training course. This is exciting news as it is a strong vote of confidence in the Tezos protocol from developers around the world.
There is still a lot of work to be done in 2020 on the developer training front, but these numbers show clear progress and fulfillment of an aggressive objective set in 2018. Allocating resources towards developer tooling and integrations of Tezos into existing world-class tools like Truffle have clearly contributed to the effort.
Zastrin — 447
Zastrin offers online courses to help users learn to develop decentralized applications on blockchains. Tezos Commons funded a free Tezos course that walked users through the process of building a simple application on Tezos.
Tezos Commons Capstone — 300
The Tezos Commons Capstone course is a beginner-friendly, easily accessible introduction to Tezos development. This free course introduces the basic theories behind blockchain development and the fundamentals of the Tezos protocol and takes participants through building their own Tezos applications. 300 developers completed the Capstone course this year.
B9lab — 275
TQ Tezos, Nomadic Labs, Smart Chain Arena (developers of SmartPy), The Marigold Project (developer team for LIGO and Marigold), and other experienced Tezos developers worked with the mentors at blockchain education and talent provider B9lab to develop curriculum for two parallel Tezos development tracks. Their Tezos 101 program introduces the fundamental computer science elements of blockchain protocols and covers the basics of how Tezos works.
Tezos Blockstars provides advanced training for developers with a bit more experience looking to hit the ground running. The Tezos Foundation has committed funding to sponsor 500 seats in the Blockstars course — so there is still room for more developers to sign up for this Tezos training program in 2020.
Tezos Korea — 120
Tezos Korea ran a blockchain bootcamp in Busan that saw 120 developers enroll and participate in the training program, with 47 earning high marks. The bootcamp covered the basics of blockchain development, writing and implementing Tezos smart contracts, and building simple decentralized applications.
Tezos Southeast Asia — 94
Tezos Southeast Asia strategically partnered with several top-tier universities and research institutions in the region to host several different Tezos training programs. Nearly 100 developers have completed the NTU Masterclass in Singapore and the Tezos training courses at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand and Vietnam National University in Vietnam. Tezos Southeast Asia also announced a partnership with Tribe Accelerator to offer more developer training opportunities in Singapore.
Nomadic Labs — 61
Nomadic Labs has hosted several Tezos training programs, including a Tezos Basics course, an advanced Tezos Certification course, an in-person workshop co-hosted with Tezos Israel, and a multi-day training program in Paris. Onboarding and supporting more core developers is important for the long-term growth of the Tezos protocol.
TQ Tezos x IDEO x CoinList — 41
Earlier this year, IDEO, a world-renowned design firm, announced the launch of its Startup Studio, of which TQ Tezos and the Tezos Foundation are founding partners. IDEO popularized the ideas of design thinking and human-centered design, and established the Startup Studio as a way to help blockchain projects radically rethink the user experience for people new to the space. This year saw 41 developers participate in training sessions TQ developed for those in IDEO’s joint hackathon with CoinList as part of the Startup Studio program.
Total — 1,338
Across all of these programs, approximately 1,338 developers have received training to develop on Tezos. New developers are enrolling in Tezos-focused education programs every day: Tezos Brazil recently shared that 1,000 developers registered for its Introduction to Tezos course, Cryptonomic held workshops with Tezos Japan and Tezos UK, and Blockmatics launched its online Tezos smart contract course (to name a few of the continued developer training efforts).
Throughout 2019, teams from around the world spent significant time building a rich and diverse foundational layer of developer tooling and resources, including Nomadic Labs, Truffle, SmartPy, The Marigold Project, Stove Labs, Simplestaking, Cryptonomic, Baking Bad, TzStats, Tulip Tools, Archetype, and many others. With this infrastructure in place, along with the launch of the Tezos Developer Portal, I’m looking forward to what all of these new developers build in 2020.
