Solana Foundation, CoinDCX Announce Rs. 25-Crore Grant for India’s Web3 Developers

Ahead of India's 75th Republic Day, Indian crypto exchange CoinDCX has announced a grant programme for Indian Web3 developers in partnership with the Solana Foundation. The grant, worth Rs. 25 crore, aims to help bootstrapped Indian Web3 developers designing products on the Solana blockchain. In an official announcement shared on Thursday, January 25, CoinDCX said this initiative comes along the sidelines of this year's Republic Day theme of ‘Vikasit Bharat' (Developed India).

In the coming months, the capital from this grant will be used towards initiating advanced blockchain education programmes as well as hackathon-like competitions within Web3 developers. CoinDCX Ventures has also decided to invest in the best teams emerging from these hackathons.

“We need to cultivate talent for sustained market share and leadership in blockchain software development. With India already contributing 11 percent of global web3 developers, I expect an encouraging ecosystem and government support to transform the country into a web3 powerhouse,” said Sumit Gupta, Co-Founder of CoinDCX.

Gupta said Web3 firms in India must draw parallels with India's overall mammoth IT industry that currently has a valuation of $200 billion (roughly Rs. 16,62,210 crore) and is poised to reach $350 billion (roughly Rs. 29,09,292 crore) in revenues by 2030.

As part of the deal, Solana Foundation will work with CoinDCX to advance real-world use cases of public blockchains, such as loyalty programs and tokenisation of real-world assets like stocks, bonds, and real estate.

“There is huge potential for mass adoption of blockchain technology and real-world use cases. India having over a billion mobile users, the grant will strategically emphasise the development of Web3 apps on mobile,” said Neeraj Khandelwal, Co-Founder, CoinDCX as saying.

CoinDCX seems to be diving deeper into India's Web3 market, intensifying the competition with contemporaries like CoinSwitch, Mudrex, and Giottus among others. This is also happening at a time when the government of India has directed all crypto firms to strictly adhere to registering with the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) while also meeting all KYC and AML guidelines.

As for the Solana Foundation, this marks a notable opportunity to engage with Indian Web3 developers. Its eco-friendly Solana blockchain was recently chosen by Dubai to provide the blockchain infrastructure for its free economic zone, called the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre (DMCC).