After weeks of community discussion and a 7-days voting period, the Moonbeam community has approved two Level 3 Grants ecosystem proposals posted by StellaSwap and Moonwell, respectively, as part of the Moonbeam Foundation Grants Program. The program, proposed and approved by the Moonbeam community, will support the growth of the ecosystem.
Community-Driven Ecosystem Grants Process
The Moonbeam Grants program’s goal is to further the adoption, utilization, and development of Moonbeam as a premier destination for cross-chain connected smart contracts and applications. The Moonbeam community proposed and voted for a new community-driven process to issue grants to ecosystem projects. Led by Teriyaki Don, Moonbeam community member, the now-executed proposal aims to involve the community in important decisions for the Moonbeam ecosystem going forward.
Moonwell and StellaSwap posted two Ecosystem Level 3 Grants proposals with the goal of boosting the growth and activity of the Moonbeam ecosystem. The proposals were discussed by the global community and followed by a highly participated voting period with over 1,000 votes.
This is a step forward in the continued effort of the Moonbeam ecosystem to increase community involvement in key decisions of the Moonbeam network. The Moonbeam community is encouraged to participate in public discussions in the recently announced Moonbeam Community Forum.
Moonbeam Ignite: A Campaign Designed to Spark the Moonbeam Ecosystem
In furtherance of the goals set out by the teams in the community-approved grant proposals, StellaSwap and Moonwell announced the launch of the Moonbeam Ignite campaign.
StellaSwap is a decentralized exchange that features a standard AMM, a stable AMM, and a concentrated liquidity AMM on Moonbeam. Moonwell is an open and permissionless lending and borrowing protocol on Moonbeam and is the largest DeFi protocol by TVL in the Dotsama ecosystem. Both Level-3 Ecosystem Grant recipients designed Moonbeam Ignite to boost the growth of the Moonbeam ecosystem.
As described by Moonwell, “this campaign aims to IGNITE the growth of the Moonbeam DeFi ecosystem by creating a solid foundation of liquidity for Wormhole bridged assets and support for basic DeFi primitives (Swap, Lend, Borrow), all of which are vital for user and developer expansion.”
Approximately 12M GLMR (dubbed “Moonbeam Ignite GLMR” by StellaSwap and Moonwell as part of the campaign) will be distributed to the users of StellaSwap and Moonwell team during the campaign’s 6-month lifespan according to the milestones and other conditions outlined in the grants.
The StellaSwap and Moonwell grants introduce a relatively new player to the Moonbeam ecosystem: Wormhole’s Portal Bridge. Wormhole was selected in the community approved grant proposals by Moonwell and StellaSwap after an analysis published by StellaSwap and governance process by Moonwell’s community that overwhelmingly voted for Wormhole. Wormhole assets that will be featured in the Ignite Moonbeam campaign include:
- USDC.wh – USDC wrapped by the Wormhole bridge
- ETH.wh – Ethereum wrapped by the Wormhole bridge
- wBTC.wh – wBTC wrapped by the Wormhole bridge
- BUSD.wh – BUSD wrapped by the Wormhole bridge
For more information on the grants, including objectives, milestones, and use of funds, please see StellaSwap’s Ecosystem Grant Proposal and Moonwell Artemis Grant Proposal.
Igniting the Moonbeam Ecosystem
While Moonwell and StellaSwap were the direct recipients of the Level 3 grants, both teams’ grant proposals emphasized the desire to use the grants to help bootstrap the broader Moonbeam ecosystem. As Moonwell outlined in their proposal, by first building a solid foundation of activity and liquidity in DeFi primitives such as Moonwell and StellaSwap, the Moonbeam ecosystem can better attract and support developers to build additional DeFi protocols that layer on top of the base DeFi primitives, and new and novel applications such as NFT marketplaces and Multichain Dapps using connected contracts. This envisioned flywheel for ecosystem growth from the StellaSwap and Moonwell grants is supported by a foundation of the major infrastructure and tools needed by leading DApps.
Builders on Moonbeam have access to an extensive toolkit, including:
- Oracles: Chainlink, DIA
- APIs & Indexers: The Graph, Covalent, SubQuery, Subsquid
- Wallets: MetaMask, Ledger, Nova, Talisman, Subwallet
- Multisig: Moonbeam Safe (Gnosis Safe fork)
- Custody Provider: Fireblocks
- Explorers: Etherscan, Subscan
- Dev Tools: Hardhat, Scaffold.eth, OpenZeppelin, Gelato, Remix, Mars, Waffle, Truffle, Tenderly
- RPC Providers: Blast, OnFinality, Pinata (for NFTs)
- VRF (randomness function): API3, WitNet
For a full list of integrations, refer to project listing sites like Downtown Moonbeam.
The ecosystem continues to expand at an impressive pace. Downtown Moonbeam reports over 200 projects that have already deployed to Moonbeam smart contract platform ranging from well-established multi-chain DeFi applications to new and promising native projects, which are central to kickstarting the next wave of DApps driven by interoperability.
Building on Moonbeam
From its early development, Moonbeam has been focused on its ecosystem. That includes designing a developer-friendly network and comprehensive support programs for projects that deploy. Outstanding projects in the Moonbeam ecosystem have received grants to support its development in broad scope, including the development of applications, infrastructure, tooling, and education programs, as well as project initiatives that bootstrap activity, adoption, and overall growth of Moonbeam.
The Moonbeam Foundation encourages teams building on Moonbeam in need of funding to apply to the Moonbeam Grants Program for Level 1 and Level 2 grants. Learn more about the Grant Program and how to apply on the Moonbeam Foundation website. Builders should explore their eligibility for funding from the Treasury Program.
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