Unified Open Source DAO Analytics for Cardano

[Proposal setup] Proposal title

Please provide your proposal title

Unified Open Source DAO Analytics for Cardano

[Proposal Summary] Budget Information

Enter the amount of funding you are requesting in ADA

75000

[Proposal Summary] Time

Please specify how many months you expect your project to last

4

[Proposal Summary] Translation Information

Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated

No

Original Language

en

[Proposal Summary] Problem Statement

What is the problem you want to solve?

Cardano lacks a unified, open-source tool to track DAO metrics like participation, treasury activity, and growth, making it hard for users to stay informed across the growing number of DAO platforms.

[Proposal Summary] Project Dependencies

Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

No

Describe any dependencies or write 'No dependencies'

No dependencies.

[Proposal Summary] Project Open Source

Will your project's outputs be fully open source?

Yes

License and Additional Information

The project outputs will be released under the GNU General Public License (GPL).

[Theme Selection] Theme

Please choose the most relevant theme and tag related to the outcomes of your proposal

DAO

[Campaign Category] Category Questions

Mention your open source license and describe your open source license rationale.

The project will be released under the GNU General Public License (GPL). This ensures that the software remains freely available, transparent, and community-driven. By choosing GPL, we guarantee that any modifications or extensions must also remain open-source, preventing closed-source forks and fostering collaborative development. We believe this approach aligns best with Cardano's as well as our values.

How do you make sure your source code is accessible to the public from project start, and people are informed?

As our team has done for previous open source Catalyst projects, we will continuously publish the project source code on GitHub along the way. Moreover, we will make announcements via our social media channels to ensure people remain informed about the progress.

How will you provide high quality documentation?

We will maintain public documentation alongside the code repository, covering installation, configuration, and API usage. We will keep it updated for each release. Furthermore, tutorials and use-case examples will be provided to support both technical and non-technical users.

[Your Project and Solution] Solution

Please describe your proposed solution and how it addresses the problem

We will develop an open-source platform to aggregate and analyze data from all major DAO frameworks on Cardano. The tool will collect metrics such as governance participation rates, voting patterns, proposal histories, community sizes, treasury balances, and fund movements. By presenting this information in one unified interface, the platform will make it easier for users, researchers, and developers to track DAO activity across the ecosystem.

We will provide a well-documented API backend, enabling developers to easily fetch and integrate DAO analytics into their own applications. This directly addresses the current lack of a unified, transparent source for DAO analytics on Cardano, reducing information fragmentation and empowering more informed participation for Cardano's DAOs.

[Your Project and Solution] Impact

Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community

As more Cardano projects adopt DAO structures, governance becomes a key driver of decision-making, treasury management, and community direction. For DAOs to function effectively, participants need clear, accessible, and up-to-date information about what is happening -- from voting activity and proposal outcomes to treasury changes and member engagement trends. Without this visibility, communities risk low participation, decision-making dominated by a few insiders, and reduced trust in the governance process.

Our project will address these challenges by making DAO activity across the Cardano ecosystem easy to track in one place. This will help:

• Increase transparency: ensuring all stakeholders have equal access to governance and treasury information.
• Boost participation: making it easier for community members to stay informed and engage in timely decisions.
• Foster collaboration and research: enabling developers, researchers, and journalists to analyze trends, compare DAOs, and identify best practices.

By lowering the information barrier, we help DAOs on Cardano become more inclusive, accountable, and effective -- strengthening both individual communities and the broader ecosystem.

[Your Project and Solution] Capabilities & Feasibility

What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Our team has extensive experience building secure, high-performance blockchain analytics and DeFi tools on Cardano. We have successfully delivered multiple Catalyst-funded projects, including complex data aggregation platforms and governance tools. Our prior work with Cardano smart contracts, APIs, and off-chain infrastructure ensures that we can handle the technical challenges of integrating multiple DAO frameworks and data sources.

We will validate feasibility early by starting with a proof-of-concept that aggregates data from a small set of DAOs (in particular, the MuesliSwap DAO) using different governance models. This will allow us to confirm data access methods, test API performance, and refine the database schema before scaling up to support the full range of DAO platforms. Regular community feedback will be gathered through open GitHub issues, forums, and social media to ensure the solution meets real user needs.

By combining proven technical skills, a transparent development process, and early validation with real-world data, we will deliver a reliable, maintainable, and impactful analytics platform for Cardano DAOs.

[Milestones] Project Milestones

Milestone Title

DAO Landscape Research and Metrics Definition

Milestone Outputs

• Comprehensive report on the current DAO ecosystem on Cardano
• Identification of relevant metrics for community members, developers, and researchers (e.g., participation, treasury activity, proposal histories)
• Detailed plan outlining how these metrics will be implemented in the analytics platform

Acceptance Criteria

• eReport clearly defines which DAOs and metrics have been investigated, and which of them will be included in the platform
• Implementation plan specifies data sources and methods for collecting each metric

Evidence of Completion

• Published report summarizing DAO research and metrics selection
• Documented implementation plan for upcoming development milestones

Delivery Month

1

Cost

10000

Progress

20 %

Milestone Title

Core Platform Implementation and API Development

Milestone Outputs

• Backend system fetching and processing data from multiple DAO frameworks
• Unified database structure organizing all relevant DAO metrics
• Fully functional API exposing DAO data
• All development progress published incrementally on GitHub

Acceptance Criteria

• API endpoints return correct and up-to-date metrics from multiple DAOs
• Database correctly organizes and maintains data for all tracked metrics
• All core functionality is implemented and operational

Evidence of Completion

• GitHub repository containing fully functional backend code and API
• Demonstration that data fetching, processing, and endpoint serving works reliably

Delivery Month

3

Cost

50000

Progress

70 %

Milestone Title

Deployment, Documentation, and User Guides

Milestone Outputs

• Deployed API accessible to developers and end users
• Comprehensive API documentation covering endpoints, usage, and integration
• User guides for setting up the backend and interacting with the platform

Acceptance Criteria

• API is fully deployed, online and operational
• Documentation and user guides are clear, complete, and sufficient for integration and setup for other developers
• Code is publicly available on GitHub under GPL license

Evidence of Completion

• Publicly accessible deployed API
• Published API documentation and user guides
• Demonstrations showing correct setup and usage of the platform

Delivery Month

4

Cost

15000

Progress

100 %

[Final Pitch] Budget & Costs

Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources

Milestone 1:10,000 ADA

• Labor costs:
  • Research and analysis by 2 team members: 8,000 ADA
  • Project management and coordination: 2,000 ADA
• Justification: This milestone focuses on research, planning, and defining relevant metrics. The majority of the cost is for expert labor to thoroughly map the DAO landscape, identify the most meaningful metrics, and produce a detailed implementation plan.

Milestone 2: 50,000 ADA

• Labor costs:
  • Backend development and data integration by 2 developers: 38,000 ADA
  • Project management and coordination: 5,000 ADA
• Miscellaneous Costs:
  • Software, servers, and cloud infrastructure for development and testing: 7,000 ADA
• Justification: This is the most technically intensive phase, requiring extensive development work to fetch, process, and organize data from multiple DAOs, build the unified database, and implement a fully functional API. The cost reflects both the complexity of integrating multiple DAO frameworks and the need for high-quality, reliable code.

Milestone 3: 15,000 ADA

• Labor costs:
  • Deployment, API documentation, and user guide creation by 2 developers: 12,000 ADA
  • Project management: 3,000 ADA
• Justification: This milestone focuses on making the platform accessible to the wider community. Costs cover labor for writing clear documentation, preparing user guides, and final deployment, ensuring that developers and users can easily interact with the API.

[Final Pitch] Value for Money

How does the cost of the project represent value for the Cardano ecosystem?

Improving how DAOs operate and allocate their funds has a multiplier effect on the Cardano ecosystem. DAOs collectively control significant treasuries and make strategic decisions that directly influence project success, community engagement, and ecosystem growth. When these organizations have better tools for transparency, participation tracking, and treasury analysis, they can make more informed, efficient, and accountable decisions — ensuring their funds are used where they deliver the most impact.

Our analytics platform will help DAO members and stakeholders easily assess governance health, detect under-participation, and monitor how funds are managed. By empowering communities to optimize their own governance processes, this project indirectly improves “value for money” across all DAOs it covers. The investment in a single, open-source tool can thus potentially benefit dozens of communities simultaneously.

[Required Acknowledgements] Consent & Confirmation

Terms and Conditions:

Yes