Bitcoin developer who lost Bitmain funding wins Coinbase’s first-ever developer grant

The Coinbase Crypto Community Fund was awarded to João Barbosa and another pseudonymous developer.

Digital currency exchange Coinbase has awarded its first-ever Bitcoin Core developer grants, and a familiar name is among the recipients.

João Barbosa and 0xB10C, the alias of a pseudonymous developer, were selected winners earlier this week. Although the funding amounts weren’t revealed, Coinbase said both developers will “be funded to work on Bitcoin for all of 2021” in amounts payable via BTC or USD.

As Coinbase states:

Both candidates demonstrated a consistent history of contributing to Bitcoin Core, and provided the Fund’s advisory board [...] with a clear, actionable outline of the projects they intend to work on.”

Barbosa’s development work was previously funded by crypto mining firm Bitmain before his grants were abruptly cut along with fellow developer Jonas Schnelli.

Today, I lost my sponsorship.After more than 3 years, Bitmain decided to halt funding Bitcoin Core developers (also Joao Barbosa/promag).Thanks Bitmain for all the help (despite the disagreement we had)!Help me to continue my work on Bitcoin Corehttps://t.co/5FeGoB76j8❤️

— Jonas Schnelli (@_jonasschnelli_) December 1, 2020

Barbosa’s development work is centered on improving the Bitcoin Core user experience on Android and iOS mobile devices. He plans to use the grant money to develop a Bitcoin Core GUI based on the Qt Quick framework.

Coinbase first announced its Crypto Community Fund in October as a way to sponsor codebase development for Bitcoin Core. Depending on the success of the first grants, Coinbase plans to expand the program to other types of crypto projects in the future.

Bitcoin was launched in early 2009 without a fundraise or developer grants. Early developers helped pave the way for new monetary ecosystems to emerge. Now, there are over 8,100 cryptocurrencies vying for adoption spanning several industries, use cases, and geographical locations. 

João Barbosa did not immediately respond to a request for comment.