IOVLabs Announces $2.5 Million Grants Program, Launches Scaling Bitcoin Hackathon

During the first-ever Bitcoin Builders Conference in Miami, Florida, representatives of IOVLabs shared the details of its upcoming three-month hackathon and grant program for early-stage Bitcoin (BTC) developers.

IOVLabs launches $2.5 million grant initiative

According to the official announcement shared by IOVLabs, a leading tech company in the segment of Bitcoin-based dApps, it has launched a massive $2.5 million grant campaign.

Keynote livestream starts at 9 ET. Join us here 👇https://t.co/dCpQCvir8q

— ₿itcoin ₿uilders Conference | May 17 @ Miami (@buildingonbtc) May 17, 2023

This strategic grants program is designed to accelerate the adoption of Rootstock, a pioneering Bitcoin (BTC) sidechain tailored to various DeFi and NFT use cases.

IOVLabs VP of Growth Pei Chen highlighted the importance of  community events for the progress of “DeFi on Bitcoin” segment as a whole and Rootstock as its integral part:

IOVLabs’ support of the strategic grants program demonstrates our strong commitment to provide the tools needed to build a truly decentralized financial system on Bitcoin. This is an opportunity for the next generation of developers to harness the Rootstock sidechain to extend the capabilities of Bitcoin and help create a freer and fairer financial system for all.

Blockchain developers from all over the world are invited to join the grants program. To choose the most valuable products, IOVLabs organizes a hackathon in collaboration with HackerEarth, a global community of over four million software engineers.

Bitcoin-themed hackathon kicks off, four tracks invite developers

The much-anticipated hackathon will go live in May-July 2023. It will include an ideation stage, a development stage and a final pitch. Since Rootstock is fully compatible with EVM, no specific skills will be required from applicants: they can use familiar Ethereum (ETH) instruments like Hardhat, Truffle, web3.js and ethers.js.

The list of tracks in the upcoming hackathon includes interoperability tooling, user-centric utility challenges, new functionality and liquidity for DeFi, and bounty programs.

IOVLabs President Daniel Fogg is excited by the opportunities the hackathon and grants initiative are set to unlock for the next generation of developers:

With the Bitcoin Builders Conference underway, I’m excited to see how developers are harnessing Bitcoin’s potential to solve everyday challenges for people around the world. IOVLabs strongly believes Bitcoin sidechains like Rootstock will play a major role in bringing the first billion users to crypto. (…) By bringing together EVM compatibility with the unmatched security of Bitcoin, Rootstock offers developers a network that can be trusted to support the financial futures of people worldwide, no matter their economic status.

As covered by U.Today previously, on Consensus 2023, IOVLabs announced the integration of key features for the next iteration of its products.