Aligning Web3 Foundation Grants Program with Polkadot's Product-Centric Vision

Web3 Foundation (W3F) is making a strategic shift away from its traditional open Grants Program and providing streamlined funding for a product-focused vision for Polkadot and its ecosystem.

The Grants Program launched more than six years ago, before Polkadot went live, and played a critical role in bootstrapping the ecosystem. It helped attract thousands of applications and supported the delivery of hundreds of milestones across core infrastructure, tooling, and early ecosystem needs. Over the early years of Polkadot ecosystem development, the W3F-funded open grants program with transparent processes (tracked publicly via platforms like GitHub) proved to be the most effective way to accelerate development, effectively serving as a transparent off-chain funding mechanism.

Over the last few years, the ecosystem has obtained significant funding from the Polkadot OpenGov on-chain treasury, sub-treasuries and bounties for development and maintenance of the core protocol infrastructure. Web3 Foundation complemented the on-chain funding efforts through programs like Decentralized Futures, Strategic grants, and Founder grants, focusing on Polkadot's success.

Today, Web3 Foundation is playing an active role through its direct participation in Polkadot OpenGov and is moving away from the open grants model by shifting its efforts to:

1. Targeted Strategic Funding: Rather than requesting broad, open-ended proposals through the grants program, W3F will streamline its funding to initiate and support key initiatives relevant to the core protocol development and the product-centric vision of Polkadot. W3F will continue to steward initiatives like Decentralized JAM, enabling Polkadot's next major protocol iteration.
2. Support for Ecosystem Funding: W3F will bring its technical expertise into the existing Polkadot governance processes by assisting with rigorous reviews of proposals and keeping track of their milestone deliveries. W3F will actively engage with and support the key ecosystem projects and teams deemed vital for Polkadot's success by the Polkadot Technical Fellowship, as well as Parity Technologies, which is primarily entrusted with the delivery of the product-centric vision of Polkadot.

Polkadot's next phase will be shaped by its ability to execute its product-centric vision effectively. To support this, W3F must continue to evolve alongside the Polkadot network and work in full capacity to ensure Polkadot's long-term success. This strategic shift does not signal a reduction in ecosystem support. Rather, it doubles down on W3F's commitment to responsible and accountable stewardship, ensuring that the key ecosystem projects and teams seamlessly receive the necessary funding and support.