Catalyst Download: Fund12 launch party and Catalyst Working Groups in Barcelona

A few days ago in Barcelona, the heart of Catalunya, Spain, the Cardano community celebrated a launch like no other. Through the waves of fanfare and cheers of excitement, Project Catalyst—Cardano’s turbo-charged innovation engine for ecosystem growth, launched Fund12, ushering in the next round of grant funding.

The event also kicked off the Catalyst Working Groups (CWG24) program. This Fund11 initiative was voted on by you, the community - in collaboration with the Catalyst team, Rare Network, and SustainableADA - to bring these in-person events to life. So, let’s get into it.

CWG24 establishes a global network of community groups whose research and efforts will contribute to the creation of a Cardano community-led strategy and thesis to inform potential changes to future Catalyst funding rounds. The idea for these groups is to spark an honest dialogue and serve as an opportunity for innovators to ideate potential solutions in real time, or at the very least get the ball rolling!

Content creators should be supported by the community through the Catalyst fund to champion the spread of informative content about the Cardano ecosystem individually or as part of co-marketing partnerships. These were both food for thought solutions to topics that considered how to realize more mainstream attention and adoption for the Cardano ecosystem. These conversations only matter if you add your voice to them, so be sure to look for any workshops happening in your area over the next few weeks.

Catalyst’s next funding round has commenced! Another fifty million ada (₳50m) is available to inspire a new cohort of next generation Cardano-based applications and use cases with ₳22.5m ada available for DApp builders, for Cardano open-source developers with ₳10.5m allocated in Cardano Open: Developers and grassroots growth hacking and education with ₳5.5m available in Cardano Open: Ecosystem.

Fund12 also sees the introduction of an exciting new paradigm and potential opportunity for Cardano. Proposals submitted to all these categories will be voted on, as always, by the community in July to decide which projects are funded in the twelfth iteration of the Catalyst grants program.

Cardano Partners and Real World Integrations will offer awards of up to ₳2m for proposals involving big name brands and organizations to ignite real world industry partnerships to continue building out Cardano. A total of ₳8m is available for proposals that address one or more of these goals:

1. Having industry leaders, institutions, and large entities piloting the utility of the Cardano blockchain technology in their businesses
   
   Example: Auto maker wants to integrate Cardano wallets into their cars).
   
2. Advertising or marketing collaborations that raise awareness of the Cardano blockchain
   
   Example: Collaboration between media, content, and sports brand activates a primetime advertising campaign to attract new users to Cardano projects
   
3. Elevating high potential early stage and start up businesses leveraging the Cardano blockchain, and their founders to a large network of professional investors, partners and accelerators
   
   Example: Worldwide tech accelerator program wants to create an entrepreneurship programme for startup leaders building on Cardano

All this excitement and revitalized partnership potential would not be possible in Catalyst without another significant change.

Establishing the CFC means that this foundation company has the mandate to receive treasury funds and disburse such funds to those approved for funding by the Catalyst community. It also delivers Catalyst necessary protections for all involved, helping to safeguard innovations that flow from the grants program and ensure that Catalyst will be around for many years to come.

What else does it mean for active and newly funded projects? Well, it’s mostly very little change. Each project must achieve milestones which the Cardano community will verify that deliverables were met, keeping everyone honest and accountable.

Catalyst funded-projects will be entering into a grant agreement with CFC meaning applicants, whether they are individuals or legal entities, will go through identity and due diligence checks to ensure that the funding program maintains compliance with regulatory best-practices.

Applications opened on Monday, April 29th and will close on May 13th at 11:00 UTC for general categories and June 6th for the Cardano Partners category.

And if you’re still a little hesitant, in Fund11, 1 in 3 proposals were selected for funding - so the odds may in fact be ever in your favor!

Good luck to all Fund12 applicants and congratulations to all CWG24 hosts for your part in shaping the future of Catalyst.

We look forward to seeing you!