Ecosystem Vault
The Vault is aimed at empowering builders on Fantom by offering a decentralized avenue for funding projects, ideas, and creations through a community-driven funding process.
The Ecosystem Vault collects 10% of the transaction fees on Fantom, used for funding projects building on Fantom.
The Vault represents a valuable opportunity for projects to secure funding in their efforts to build innovative dApps on Fantom and offers the Fantom community a chance to come together and shape the future of the platform through its funding decisions.
Funds from the Ecosystem Vault are distributed to projects in quarterly funding rounds hosted on Gitcoin. These rounds are composed of users voting on participating projects to determine the amount of funding the projects receive from the Vault. Note that the Vault rounds are separate from the rounds in the Gitcoin Grants program.
Furthermore, unlike the Gitcoin Grants program that requires users to donate actual FTM to vote, the Vault funding rounds give users special valueless tokens called GitcoinVote with which to vote. This removes the need for users to make personal donations to projects and introduces a first-of-its-kind funding initiative.
The GitcoinVote tokens empower community members to cast their votes to fund their preferred Fantom projects. To maintain the integrity of the voting process and mitigate Sybil attacks, only votes from users with Gitcoin Passport verification will be considered (more below).
Once projects have been approved to participate in a funding round, they will receive 1 million GitcoinVote tokens, which they can distribute to their users to use for voting. If projects wish to receive more tokens, they can contact the Fantom Foundation to receive a limitless amount of GitcoinVote tokens.
Users have a max voting power of 100 GitcoinVote tokens.
Users cannot vote on a project with less than 1 GitcoinVote.
The key for projects is to distribute 100 GitcoinVote tokens to as many users as possible.
Our step-by-step explanation of the funding rounds below will clarify the concept.
- 1.A project applies to a funding round
- 2.Once approved, the project receives 1 million GitcoinVote tokens
- 1.If projects wish to receive more tokens, they can contact the Fantom Foundation to receive a limitless amount of GitcoinVote tokens.
- 3.The project distributes these tokens to its users however they wish
- 4.These users head to the funding round on Gitcoin and cast their votes using the GitcoinVote tokens on the projects they believe deserve funding
- To prevent Sybil attacks, each user must have set up a Gitcoin Passport for their votes to count (more below)
- Each user only has a max voting power of 100 GitcoinVote tokens and cannot vote on a project with less than 1 GitcoinVote
- 5.Once the round is completed, funding will be calculated according to the quadratic funding model described below, and funds will be streamed to projects in real time through LlamaPay over three months
Gitcoin uses a unique funding method known as quadratic funding. The more unique votes a project receives, the higher its funding will be. In the example below, 1 GitcoinVote equals $1.

Example of quadratic funding
For example, if Project A receives 100 GitcoinVote in total from only one community member, while Project B receives 100 GitcoinVote in total from ten different community members, Project B will receive more funding as it has wider community support. This system encourages broader community participation as opposed to singular large votes.
Once the matching has been completed, each team will receive its allocated amount over three months. These payments will be streamed in real time through LlamaPay.
All projects are welcome to apply. For projects that have been active for under three months, the Fantom Foundation will determine their eligibility. During the first round, the Foundation will choose only a select number of applicants to guarantee that only projects dedicated to using the funds to enhance the Fantom ecosystem participate.
For users to participate and vote, they must receive GitcoinVote tokens from one of the participating projects. Furthermore, they must register for a Gitcoin Passport, which is an identity verification application. Upon successful registration, users will be eligible to vote.
Project eligibility criteria:
Applicants that have been active for less than 3 months may be eligible only as decided by the Fantom Foundation.
Funds must be utilized to advance projects on Fantom. Funds are not meant for charitable endeavors outside of this scope.
Projects can receive a maximum of 15% of the FTM available in a funding round.
It’s important to be realistic and have a clear objective, which will help as you write your project application. Know your strengths, weaknesses, resources, and support, and you can make a much stronger case for why you should receive funding.
Since it is the community voting on your proposal, it is a great idea to gain trust and recognition with the Fantom community by building strong relationships with its members. Get involved in discussions or help out other builders.
Remember to keep your application concise and readable. Focus on facts and avoid paragraphs that are longer than 4–5 lines. By following these tips, you can effectively communicate your project and its need for funding to the Fantom community!
The Fantom Foundation reserves the right to halt or reject an applicant if it deems the project to be against the best interests of the Fantom network.
Last modified 24d ago