Castle Labs Launches $50k Grant Program for Builders on Arbitrum

Fort Labs, a Analysis agency led by analysts Chilla and CryptoNdee, has launched a grant program providing as much as $50,000 per venture to assist revolutionary builders on the Arbitrum blockchain, aiming to encourage recent concepts and long-term improvement throughout the ecosystem.

The initiative, which has already been operational for eight months with 4 extra to run earlier than its deadline, seeks to fund early-stage startups that prioritize originality and alignment with Arbitrum’s objectives. This transfer comes as Arbitrum continues to display robust development in transaction volumes and person engagement, reinforcing the community’s place as a hub for decentralized functions.

Program Particulars and Targets

The grant program, managed by Fort Labs on behalf of the Arbitrum DAO, focuses on “New Protocols and Concepts,” offering monetary backing to groups constructing sustainable initiatives totally on Arbitrum, although multichain approaches are acceptable if Arbitrum performs a distinguished function.

With a complete of 240 functions acquired thus far, this system has authorised fewer than 10 p.c, reflecting a rigorous choice course of that emphasizes high quality over amount. Candidates can request funding as much as $50,000 to assist cowl improvement prices for prototypes, milestones, and preliminary launches.

Fort Labs has outlined clear standards for analysis, beginning with innovation because the core requirement. Initiatives ought to introduce new primitives or distinctive options relatively than replicating present functions from different chains. For example, authorised grantees embrace Cyclo Finance, which explores novel monetary mechanisms; Maldouy, which bridges off-chain use instances with on-chain infrastructure; and Alloc8, working on the intersection of decentralized finance (DeFi) and synthetic intelligence (AI). These examples illustrate how this system values originality throughout varied sectors, together with DeFi, client apps, and AI, whereas remaining open to different verticals so long as they bring about one thing recent to the desk.

Past innovation, ecosystem alignment is vital, that means initiatives ought to combine effectively with present Arbitrum instruments and contribute to the community’s imaginative and prescient of supporting DeFi builders, AI initiatives, and functions driving broader adoption.

The analysis additionally assesses workforce high quality, favoring clear teams open to know-your-customer (KYC) processes and able to execution, even when they lack intensive crypto expertise. Feasibility comes into play by means of well-defined milestones and key efficiency indicators (KPIs) which might be trackable and life like, guaranteeing the grant results in tangible progress with out overpromising.

Lastly, affect and sustainability are weighed, with a choice for experiments that would scale, appeal to customers, and profit the group long-term. Fort Labs encourages functions that tackle how the venture will preserve viability after funding ends, avoiding short-term ventures that fizzle out. This structured strategy helps filter out low-effort submissions, equivalent to these generated by AI with out substantive workforce involvement, which have been a standard difficulty within the assessment course of.

Arbitrum’s Current Momentum

The grant program arrives amid notable developments for Arbitrum, which has solidified its standing as a number one Layer-2 scaling resolution for Ethereum. In late October, the community achieved a milestone of two billion on-chain transactions, highlighting its scalability and person attraction.

Day by day lively wallets have numbered within the lots of of 1000’s, with current 24-hour durations seeing over 2.6 million transactions. Arbitrum additionally turned the primary Layer-2 to surpass $400 billion in cumulative swap quantity on the Uniswap protocol, per knowledge from Dune dashboards, a benchmark that displays its dominance in decentralized alternate (DEX) exercise.

All Time Protocol Quantity on Arbitrum

Different metrics additional paint an image of development. Just lately, Arbitrum’s ecosystem complete worth locked (TVL) has stabilized at excessive ranges, supporting over $1.1 billion in DEX quantity. By Q2 2025, the community had facilitated greater than $27.5 billion in bridged belongings, involving 17.3 million transfers and interesting 4 million customers. These figures, tracked by means of platforms like DefiLlama and Arbiscan, present Arbitrum outperforming friends in areas like perpetual futures quantity and chain income, making it a gorgeous base for brand spanking new initiatives.

Utility Course of and Subsequent Steps

developer groups ought to assessment the rules offered by Fort Labs, guaranteeing their proposals spotlight innovation, workforce strengths, possible objectives, and potential affect. Submissions could be made by way of the hyperlink, the place candidates element their venture imaginative and prescient, milestones, and the way it aligns with Arbitrum. Fort Labs advises towards generic or AI-assisted pitches, as a substitute favoring genuine concepts from dedicated groups.

As soon as authorised, grantees obtain funding in tranches tied to milestones, with ongoing assist to trace progress. This setup not solely aids particular person initiatives but additionally contributes to Arbitrum’s broader objective of fostering a vibrant, experimental group. Builders contemplating multichain methods ought to emphasize Arbitrum’s function, maybe by leveraging its low-cost transactions or integration with Ethereum mainnet.

Sources:

• _{$50,000 Arbitrum DAO Grant Announcement (Chilla X Account): https://x.com/chilla_ct/standing/1983207757256777916}
• _{Arbitrum One Day by day Transaction Chart (Arbiscan): https://arbiscan.io/chart/tx}
• _{Arbitrum Chain TVL and Metrics (DefiLlama): https://defillama.com/chain/arbitrum}
• _{All Time Protocol Quantity on Arbitrum (Dune Analytics): https://dune.com/queries/3582330/6032713}