ZK INFRASTRUCTURE GRANTS
ZK grants from ecosystem foundations fund their own stack. We fund the layer that every stack needs — proving systems, tooling and privacy infrastructure — and we do it as a fund, not a foundation: the grant is the first step, the round is the second.
What we fund
- Proving systems & zkVMs — performance work, new arithmetizations, hardware acceleration.
- ZK for AI — zkML inference proofs, verifiable agents, private model execution.
- Developer tooling — Noir/Circom libraries, coprocessors, verifiers, audit tooling.
- Privacy rails — private payments, identity, selective disclosure.
What we usually pass on
- Another general-purpose L2 without a distinct thesis.
- Pure academic research with no path to a component someone will deploy.
How it works
Bring the idea — we bring the round
Two-minute form. Every application gets an answer.
Apply for a grant ▸Frequently asked questions
Is a research-stage ZK project fundable?
Yes if it ends in a deployable component. "$40K gets the prover benchmark public and a Noir library on testnet in 10 weeks" is fundable; a paper alone is not.
How is this different from an EF or Aztec grant?
Apply to both — they do not exclude each other. Foundations fund their ecosystem; we fund your company and continue into a round.
What do you look for in the application?
A specific thesis, a reason it must be on-chain/ZK, evidence you can ship, and a milestone the money completes. One page.
See also: the grant program · live tracker of all active web3 grants · application template · journal.