ICF Ecosystem Growth Delegations: Applications Now Open

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As part of the overhauled ICF ATOM delegation program announced in February, we are opening applications for the Ecosystem Growth Delegations tranche today.

This is the application-only side of the program. It is separate from the default delegations tranche, which is allocated automatically based on on-chain criteria. Ecosystem Growth Delegations are negotiated individually, governed by a written agreement between the recipient and the ICF, and reserved for work that addresses a concrete, near-term ecosystem need.

Application: Form

What this program is for

Ecosystem Growth Delegations are not a general validator support program. They are not a way to recognize past contributions, and they are not a substitute for a grant. They are a mechanism for the ICF and Cosmos Labs to direct ATOM toward specific, forward-looking work where a clear deliverable is on the table.

The bar is high. Delegations under this tranche come out of the default tranche pro-rata, so every approval reduces what the rest of the active set receives. Priority goes to proposals that are specific, scoped, and tied to outcomes we can measure within a quarter or two.

What to expect after you apply

Applications go to the Cosmos Labs Ecosystem Team for initial review. Within a reasonable window, we will come back with one of three responses: a decline, a request for more information, or a green light to move into the agreement phase. Please allow 1-2 weeks for us to process your application, depending on volume.

Approved applicants enter into a written delegation agreement directly with the Interchain Foundation, with a scope-of-services appendix that lays out the deliverables and the delegation amount. Larger or non-standard agreements take longer to process than smaller ones.

Applicants who are not currently in the active set should expect a separate KYC step. Active-set validators are already covered by our ongoing compliance monitoring; new entrants without an address history are not.

Delegations are adjusted on a quarterly cadence. Agreements signed mid-quarter will generally take effect at the next adjustment.

How to apply

The form is here: Form

It asks for team background, a detailed scope of work, the milestones and timeline you are committing to, the delegation amount you are proposing, and the connection between your work and value to the Hub or ATOM. Come prepared. Vague applications, or applications that read as a request for general support rather than a proposal for specific work, will be declined.

What’s in scope

This initial intake runs as an open RFP. Feel free to submit an application for anything that aligns with the guidelines set forth above.

For full context on the broader delegation program redesign and how this tranche fits into it, read the ICF’s announcement: https://medium.com/the-interchain-foundation/the-interchain-foundation-icf-is-rolling-out-an-overhaul-of-its-atom-delegation-program-c2a65fe79b6c

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Excellent initiative by the ICF. Efficient capital allocation is exactly what the Hub needs right now to retain talent.

Regarding the specific need for Data Analytics APIs and Indexers mentioned in the RFP: I strongly recommend the ICF delegation committee to look closely at the infrastructure already built by @serejandmyself (Citizen Web3).

While many validators simply spin up cloud servers, this team has been running bare-metal servers and has built a custom on-chain data indexer from scratch, providing public archive endpoints out of their own pocket. They already have the exact product the foundation is looking for.

This is the pure definition of “Ecosystem Growth”. We must direct institutional delegations toward independent builders who are currently bleeding capital to keep critical, decentralized infrastructure alive, rather than just inflating the top 10 validators.

@serejandmyself, make sure your team submits an application specifically targeting this RFP. The Hub needs this infrastructure funded.

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Thanks @TRAVE - we are going to submit by tomorrow evening UTC. Honestly, we have 1 small card up the sleeve. Lets see next week if we can play it =)

PS. Thank you separately for the compliment and the recognition. I highly value that :folded_hands:

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@serejandmyself The recognition is fully earned. True builders running sovereign hardware are the backbone of this network, and capital must flow to where real value is created.

Best of luck with the ICF submission tomorrow! I’ll be watching closely next week to see that “card up your sleeve.”

Keep building. Capital and infrastructure must protect each other. We win together.

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Hi @RoboMcGobo, is the first targeted RFP: IBC Transfer Analytics APIs still open for submissions?

We’ve prepared a proposal and would love to submit it if the RFP is still active. We’d really appreciate your feedback when you have a chance.

We’ve contributed extensively to the Cosmos Hub ecosystem in the past, and we’d be excited for another opportunity to build and contribute more for the Hub.

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Hi! This RFP is closed unfortunately. I will remove it from this post. Thank you for your interest though!

There are no other RFPs open at this time, but we will likely add some in the coming months.

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Thanks for your reply @RoboMcGobo. Will it be posted in the forum, or do we have a group for it?

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We will post them here in the forums, as well as on the Cosmos Hub X account! I’d recommend keeping an eye on both!

Thanks again for your interest, hope to see you around more!

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We submitted our application for the ICF Growth Delegation Program a while ago and would like to kindly check on the current status of our review.
Could you please let us know how far the application has progressed?

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Hey guys! Apologies, I thought that we had discussed this already. I will send y’all a message in our tg group.

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Hey @RoboMcGobo! Can I check our application status?

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Questions Regarding the 500K ATOM Delegation to Validatier

I would like Cosmos Labs and the ICF to explain why Validatier received a 500,000 ATOM Ecosystem Growth Delegation.

Validatier is not completely without value. It collects and presents validator reward, self-stake and token-flow data. However, based on the publicly visible product, it remains a narrowly focused validator analytics dashboard rather than critical infrastructure for the Cosmos Hub.

The visible scope does not appear proportionate to a 500K ATOM delegation.

This raises several questions:

  1. What exact deliverables, milestones and maintenance obligations were included in the agreement?

  2. How was the 500K ATOM amount calculated?

  3. What measurable ecosystem value has the project delivered so far?

  4. How many active users or third-party integrations does it have?

  5. Is this data actually used by the ICF, Cosmos Labs, wallets, explorers or institutional participants?

  6. What methodology is used to classify validator tokens as “sold,” and how are false classifications, address attribution and uncertainty handled?

  7. What criteria will determine whether the delegation continues next quarter?

This is also a fairness issue.

Many validators have spent years paying for and maintaining public RPC, APIs, archive nodes, snapshots, relayers, explorers, monitoring systems and developer documentation. These services require real expenditure on servers, storage, bandwidth, upgrades and incident response, yet many receive no comparable support.

The ICF has stated that Ecosystem Growth Delegations reduce the default delegation available to the rest of the active validator set. Therefore, awarding 500K ATOM to a relatively narrow analytics product directly affects other validators.

If Validatier’s publicly visible functionality represents most of the agreed scope, the allocation appears disproportionate and unfair to validators operating more costly and widely used public infrastructure.

Please publish the non-confidential scope of services, delegation rationale, milestones, usage metrics, methodology and quarterly renewal criteria.

A 500K ATOM delegation affecting the entire validator set should be supported by transparent and measurable evidence of equivalent ecosystem value.
@RoboMcGobo

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Since we are discussing this topic, we would also like further clarification regarding the 350,000 ATOM allocated to:

“Deliver targeted Cosmos Hub community activation through live programming and follow-up content.”

What does this mean in concrete terms? We would appreciate the same level of detail and explanation for this allocation as well.

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Hey y’all! Looks like there may be a little confusion as to how the ecosystem growth delegations are calculated so i want to clarify this.

When an ecosystem growth delegation is granted, the validator forfeits their right to a default delegation (currently 288k ATOM and growing each quarter). Because of this, delegations take that into account when we award them. We calculate this internally as (default delegation amount) + (ecosystem growth delegation) = final delegation. If we didnt do it this way, some of these smaller delegations would end up receiving less than they’d get by default and have no incentive to contribute.

All of that being said, the actual delegation amounts being allocated to cybernetics and node101, respecively, are roughly 75k and 200k ATOM taking this into account. These delegations are relatively small in the grand scheme of things, reflecting our desire to incentivize smaller, experimental community efforts that we feel will provide an outsized benefit to the Hub above and beyond the small investment that we put in them.

As far as what each of these delegations is for:

  • Cybernetics have been strong advocates for Cosmos for several years now. We’re working with them to increase our presence on live, structured twitter spaces and other live content, as part of our effort to increase our comms with the community. You may recall the injective USDC twitter space we were on a couple of months ago that got over 1000 concurrent listeners. This was organized entirely by the Cybernetics team and is an example of the type of content we hope to continue with them as part of this delegation. We’re also looking to revisit efforts around community engagement events (more on this soon) which we think their team will be perfect to help with.
  • The validatier delegation came from conversations we were having with the Node101 team long before the tokenomics work was started. We needed a simple way to track validator commission sales as part of our analysis on inflation, and their team was happy to step up and assist. Since then, things have evolved a bit. We’ve kicked off tokenomics work and expect this to be an input into further development of the dashboard. We’ll be using it to monitor validator commission sales throughout phase 2 and beyond as we look at what levers may make the most sense to pull on as we propose tokenomcs adjustments. The dashboard also works in reverse. We’ll be using it to evaluate whether staking ATOM is profitable enough for validators today to justify inflation changes, determining whether smaller validators at risk of falling out of the set in the event of a cut are actually making healthy choices with their commissions (i.e., reinvesting them), etc.

One line i do feel it’s important to draw with folks at this stage. These are delegations that came about as a result of proactive conversations and applications sent between these teams and us/ICF. They’re made solely at our discretion. The delegation program is not the same as a public, community funded grants program in which the community is entitled to examine proposal details. We can share some small details where prudent (and are excited to do so for community-facing products!) But this is ultimately at our discretion.

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The program was explicitly presented as being based on specific, clearly scoped and measurable deliverables, formalized through written agreements, or am I wrong ? However, the ICF never stated that those agreements or their detailed terms would be made public.

The issue is therefore not that the ICF broke a formal promise of full transparency. The issue is that the community currently has no way to verify whether the standards publicly announced for this program are actually being applied. We cannot see the non-confidential scope of work, the milestones, the success criteria, what has already been delivered, or what remains to be delivered.

Regarding Cybernetics, the only concrete achievement publicly highlighted so far appears to be an X Space that attracted more than 1,000 live listeners. But since the event focused on Injective and USDC, it is reasonable to question how much of that audience was actually brought in by Cybernetics, rather than simply coming from Injective’s own established community.

From my perspective, Cybernetics has not yet demonstrated any clear additional value for the Cosmos Hub ecosystem or its community that would justify such a substantial delegation. This concern is even stronger given that members of the group have openly criticized the Cosmos community on Telegram.

If the delegation is genuinely tied to specific and measurable deliverables, the ICF should at least disclose a non-confidential summary of the scope, milestones and evaluation criteria. Otherwise, the community is simply being asked to trust that the selection process and the announced standards were properly followed, without any meaningful way to verify it.

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Well the hub community has acted cringy in the past. You can’t blame Cybernetics for being skeptical.

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