2025 Grant Summit
The 2025 Grant Summit is a 2-day virtual gathering focused on advancing the future of funding in Web3. Our goal is to bring together high-context grant operators, legacy grantees, and capital researchers to explore how we fund, sustain, and measure meaningful work in the ecosystem.
This year’s theme focuses on two critical challenges:
1. Sustainable Funding & Growth: How to design programs that last, support ecosystem maturity, and create better outcomes for builders.
2. Outputs, Outcomes & Impact How to measure value, align incentives, and track the real-world effects of grants beyond surface metrics.
Organized by the Grant Innovation Lab at Metagov, this summit is designed for those who are shaping capital allocation across the stack from infrastructure and public goods to grantee experience and capital design strategy.
Who It’s For
Grant Program Operators
Protocols
Legacy Builders / Grantees
Capital Allocation/ Grant Researchers
Format & Dates
Format: 2-day virtual event
Day 1: Grant Operators & Program Design
Day 2: Grantees, Researchers & Support Models
Date: August 20 & 21, 2025
Recording: Sessions will be livestreamed, recorded, and uploaded for later viewing.
Thematic Tracks
Sustainable Funding & Growth
Designing programs for long-term ecosystem health
Post-funding support, off-ramps, and sustainability
Balancing experimentation with structural stability
Cross-ecosystem learnings: Web2, philanthropy, DAOs
Outputs, Outcomes & Impact
What counts as impact in Web3 and who defines it
Tracking and sharing outcomes beyond vanity metrics
Designing grant programs that reward meaningful results
Tools, methods, and research that bring clarity to chaos
Program
Wednesday Aug 20th
9am EST - Intro by Eugene from Metagov
9:10 - Call to Action by Alex from ARIA
9:30 - Designing Grants that Grow with Your Ecosystem by Anke from Stellar
9:50 - Ethereum Foundation Grants by Federico from EF
10:10 - Strategy in Funding with Capital Design by Feems (Independent Researcher)
10:30 - Passive Quadratic Funding to Decentralize Philanthropy (Fireside Chat) with Robbie from Endaoment
10:50 - Octant Accelerator by Mashal Waqar
11:10 - Fair Collective Decision Making Through Plurality: Results from Gitcoin by Joel Miller from University of Illinois Chicago
11:30 - Grants Vs Markets: Case study (Fireside Chat) with Vaughn from Butter
11:50 - AI Do's and Don'ts by Rubinovitz from Tenfold
12:10 - Filling the Gap: Funding in Latin America (Fireside Chat) with Cush from Odisea
12:30 - Day 1 Wrap-Up by Mike from Metagov
Thursday Aug 21st
9am EST - Intro by Eugene from Metagov
9:10 - Creating and Using Evidence in Web3 Decision Making by Mike from Metagov
9:30 - Grantee success: Collaboration, acceleration, and measuring impact (Panel) with Isla Munro-Hochmayr, Kitty VO, Kacie Adams
10:00 - Scaling Democratic Participation (Fireside Chat) with David Dao from DeepGov
10:20 - An Intelligence Layer for Web3 Grants by Rashmi and Sam from DAOStar
10:40 - A Common Approach to Impact Measurement in Web3 by Monty from ReFi DAO
11:00 - Beyond the Numbers: Quantitative Web3 Grants Data and its Limitations by Ben from Metagov
11:20 - Understanding the Real-World Impact of the Stellar Community Fund by Elliot Seeger from Stellar
11:40 - Designing Metrics-Based Grants for Verifiable Impact by Angela from TE Academy
12:00 - Crypto For Good - Identifying High-Potential Projects in the Global South and Measuring Impact by Kenneth Kou from Mercy Corps Ventures
12:20 - A Data-Driven Retrospective Framework for Grant Managers by Rohit from Open Source Observer
12:40 - Conclusion by Ben from Metagov
Organized By
The Grant Innovation Lab at Metagov, a collective exploring the frontier of public goods funding, capital design, and coordination infrastructure in Web3.