Grant Ships is an evolutionary funding approach designed to enhance resource distribution within decentralized ecosystems, particularly DAOs. In this model, “Grant Ships” are essentially subDAOs tasked with managing and distributing funds to projects within a larger ecosystem. Each Grant Ship operates as an independent funding entity, assessing proposals and allocating capital based on community-defined goals. This structure allows for multiple grant programs to co-exist and evolve concurrently, thereby supporting various projects in a way that encourages both diversity and competition.
Grant Ships operate in cycles, where community members rank and evaluate their performance through a weighted token vote. The best-performing Grant Ships receive additional funding in future rounds, while those that underperform may be replaced. This performance-based structure incentivizes accountability and adaptive improvements, encouraging Grant Ships to refine their funding strategies continuously. As such, Grant Ships foster a pluralistic environment where various approaches to funding can be tested and optimized over time.
The concept of Grant Ships is ideal for ecosystems seeking to reduce governance overhead while maximizing funding efficiency. By distributing decision-making across multiple, competing Grant Ships, the system can manage funding for a wide array of projects with a higher degree of resilience to capture risks, ensuring a transparent and community-aligned process.