trustan initiative to support open source Bitcoin developers based in the Southern Hemisphere, has announced the recipients of its Q3 Starter grants and new members of its ₿trust open source cohort.
1/ 📢 ₿trust Q3 Grants Announcement!
We are excited to announce the winners of our ₿trust Starter Grant and Open Source Cohort Membership for Q3 2024! 🚀
It’s a key part of our mission to empower talented Southern Hemisphere developers to contribute to Bitcoin’s open source ecosystem. pic.twitter.com/FnlgPGJoHu
— Btrust (@btrustteam) August 16, 2024
The starter grants, which will provide full-time funding to Bitcoin software engineers, demonstrate ₿trust’s dedication to increasing the number of open source Bitcoin contributors from regions such as Africa, MENA, Southeast Asia and Latin America.
Each winner will receive six months of support, including a stipend paid in Bitcoin, technical mentorship, and support in developing a proposal for long-term funding to join the ₿trust open source cohort.
Why is the ₿trust Starter Grant important?
₿trust Starter Grants provide financial stability to talented open source developers, allowing them to focus on their work without financial stress, as well as mentoring and support aimed at helping developers establish long-term, sustainable careers in the Bitcoin space.
“Through these grants, we can make a concrete contribution to decentralizing Bitcoin open source development by introducing developers with diverse perspectives and strengthening the resilience of the Bitcoin network,” the company said in a statement. Abubakar Nur Khalil, Interim CEO of ₿Trust In a press release shared with Bitcoin Magazine.
The Starter Grant also provides a pathway into the ₿trust Open Source Cohort, where developers can receive mentoring, professional development, and long-term financial support while contributing to open source initiatives.
“The aim is to make our grant recipients’ Bitcoin open source careers sustainable and create a supportive environment in which they can grow and feel a greater sense of community, in addition to the long-term financial support we provide,” Noor Khalil said.
Starter Grant Recipients
The Q3 2024 Starter grant recipients are:
Enigbe Ochekrie
Ochekrie I have over 2 years of experience in backend engineering and have worked on the following projects: Galloy’s Stables and Easy PayPayment Service Providers (PSPs).
Ochekrie is Lightning Developer Kitof Rusty Lightning Through the grant, she will also work to improve the onboarding process for new contributors to Bitcoin open source projects.
Tobechi Chukwureta
Chukureta I am an experienced back-end developer with a background in data analytics. BTCPay Server Especially the multisig capabilities of the system and features related to plugin development.
Funding from the Starter Grant will support him to continue improving BTCPay Server’s store functionality and the platform’s modularity.
Kelvin Ishievore
Isiewwore He currently contributes to the Bitcoin open source project. Polar and LandlandWhile working under the starter grant, Ishievore will focus on streamlining the engineer testing and development process. lightning.
New members of the Open Source Cohort
New members of the ₿trust open source cohort include:
Abubakar Sadiq Ismail
Sadiq Ismail A Nigerian Bitcoin Core contributor, he is actively involved in optimizing the Bitcoin protocol. He works on key areas of Bitcoin Core such as long-term fee estimation and transaction analysis.
Sadiq Ismail’s work Mempool Fee Estimate Analysis He has demonstrated his technical capabilities and helped improve Bitcoin’s scalability and usability, and as part of the cohort he will continue this work while honing his own capabilities to contribute to the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Duncan Dean
Dean He is a Lightning contributor from South Africa and is heavily involved in the development of rust-lightning, a highly modular Lightning library.
Dean is also actively involved in projects such as: ldk review club and link,contributed to improving Continuous Integration (CI) actions and helping to maintain the robustness of the codebase.,While in the cohort, Dean aims to strengthen his ability to contribute to Bitcoin and Lightning.
Oghenovo Ushiwoma
Ushiwoma He is a Nigeria-based Bitcoin Core contributor who has been with ₿trust since 2023. Under the ₿trust Starter Grant, he Silent Payment Functionality.
As part of the ₿trust open source cohort, he will work on introducing new key formats and descriptors for silent payments in Bitcoin Core and continue enhancing Bitcoin’s privacy and scalability features.
Applying for a Trust Grant
Developers based in Africa, the MENA region, Southeast Asia and Latin America can apply for the Trust Grant.
Developers from other parts of the southern hemisphere will also be considered for grants on a case-by-case basis, primarily based on their track record in the bitcoin space.
Apply for the ₿trust Starter Grant here This trust link.
