[IMPACT] Please describe your proposed solution.

Summary

Our proposed solution is to create free regulatory guidelines for Project Catalyst to get a better understanding of what the legal risks are that the project may face as we advance towards decentralization, and to propose several options for how to deal with them.

Rationale

Decentralized governance is a novelty for the legal systems which the Project Catalyst and the Catalyst Fund could potentially be subject to. Many open questions and potential legal risks around liability, legal structure, etc. remain. In order to avoid unpleasant surprises in the future, we aim to provide legal/regulatory guidelines for Project Catalyst to help to navigate these open questions and potential challenges.

Outcomes

We aim to achieve this proposed solution in particular by:

• Examining the major legal risks for the Project Catalyst across several legal domains

• Creating a guideline report on how to deal with these risks

• Educate the community based on the guidelines through a series of free seminars.

• Continuously monitoring the legal and regulatory developments that could impact Project Catalyst through the DLT360 News Radar

• Improving the accessibility of the guidelines by integrating their findings into the DLT360 Navigator

The graphic below shows the positioning of this project in the overall DLT360 approach (The DLT360 Business Ladder: From Aggregating News, over Knowledge Management to Consulting):

[IMPACT] How does your proposed solution address the challenge and what benefits will this bring to the Cardano ecosystem?

This project will bring the following benefits to the Cardano ecosystem:

• Enabling Project Catalyst to stay clear of potential legal risks that come with running a decentralized funding mechanism.

• Enable Catalyst Proposers to become aware and stay clear of potential legal risks they could face in their role as proposers.

• Helping to evolve Project Catalyst into a more mature project that can better interact with the traditional economy and legal system.

• Educate the community about potential avenues for improving the legal structure of Project Catalyst in order to avoid future legal challenges.

  [IMPACT] How do you intend to measure the success of your project?

This project is part of the overall activities of DLT360. Nevertheless, we can identify a number of specific metrics, KPIs and qualitative factors for evaluating the mid- and long-term rate of success of this project.

• Number of seminars and seminar participants: The material generated by this project will be used in dedicated seminars. We will track this number of future activities and participants in such future activities.

• Number of views/downloads of the guidelines

• Tracking of usage in the community of the DLT360 News Radar and DLT360 Navigator Sections dedicated to these specific regulatory risks & developments in the context of decentralized funding.

  [IMPACT] Please describe your plans to share the outputs and results of your project?

The outputs of this project will be of long-term use and will be systematically shared as follows:

Publicly and freely available and shared with the community:

• A Guideline Report lays out potential legal and regulatory challenges for Project Catalyst and proposes several options on how to deal with each of them.

• Free Educational Seminars for the Cardano Community to provide a better understanding of potential future legal challenges to Project Catalyst, and to improve the accessibility of the report.

• Monitoring and alerting of legal and regulatory developments relevant to the running of a decentralized funding mechanism such as Project Catalyst through the DLT360 News Radar.

• Integration of policy and regulatory impact findings into the DLT360 Navigator as a permanently available resource to the Cardano Community

  [CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability?

DLT360 was founded by an ambitious core team coming from many years of leadership experience in business and industry, combined with the fresh perspective of young talents in various disciplines (see team description later in this proposal). The senior founders have also been active members of and contributors to the Catalyst community since early on.

DLT360's core team and extended domain expert team in the knowledge areas of

• Economy
• Technology
• Regulation
• Politics
• ESG

has grown to approximately 25 people (the majority still part-time) during the past 2 years. With Fund 10, we also want to finance the launch of the DLT360 Token as the incentive basis for growing a vibrant global community of content contributors and solution partners.

DLT360 has successfully completed various projects in Funds 6, 7 and 8. Fund 10 is now dedicated to finalizing DLT360's foundational developments. This will get us to scale up our activities in 2024, for which we are aiming for a strategic-partnership-based financing round - with the vision to become THE major think-tank and commercial consulting entity in the dynamically growing CARDANO/Web 3.0 space.

[CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] What are the main goals for the project and how will you validate if your approach is feasible?

This project is focusing on achieving the following goals and deliverables:

• Establish the latest knowledge about the main legal and regulatory risks that Project Catalyst faces

• Proof: Extensive Guideline Report (approx. 10,000 words)

• Creating free educational seminars for educating the Community on how to stay clear of these regulatory risks.

• Proof: 3 Seminars were held; Slides were shared with the Assessment team.

• Creating easily accessible Navigator and News Radar Material for increasing knowledge of the Community

• Proof: 10+ DLT360 Navigator and 10+ DLT360 News Radar Items created.

  [CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please provide a detailed breakdown of your project’s milestones and each of the main tasks or activities to reach the milestone plus the expected timeline for the delivery.

Please find the basic definition of our Milestones and the related timeline and activities below:

Milestone 1: Project, Processes & Team in place

• Timeline: End of Week 1 of 36
• Method: DLT360 program- and project management
• Activities: Setting up project infrastructure & Web-landing page, kickoff meeting

Milestone 2: Completion of Literature Review Phase

• Timeline: End of Week 4 of 36
• Method: Research in the form of a Literature Review (focus on the latest online sources)
• Activities: Establishing a list of sources in consultation with domain experts, critical reading, capturing relevant content, setting up citations in ZOTERO, summarizing results in a literature-study report

Milestone 3: Draft Guideline Report

• Timeline: End of Week 12 of 36
• Method: Academic writing
• Activities: Writing draft a guideline report on the major legal risks facing Project Catalyst and how to deal with them.

Milestone 4: Presentation slides completed

• Timeline: End of Week 18 of 36
• Method: Presentations plotting, design and production
• Activities: Creating the plotting and the design of the Presentations for our Seminars (total ~ 30 Slides)

Milestone 5: Final Guideline Report Completed

• Timeline: End of Week 26 of 36
• Method: Academic writing, Graphic design
• Activities: Editing the draft report, finalizing the report, designing the visual aspects of the report

Milestone 6: First Seminar held

• Timeline: End of Week 30 of 36
• Method: Seminar presentations via Zoom
• Activities: During this phase, we prepare, promote and hold the first of three seminars on the basis of the report created.

Milestone 7: All Seminars held and Navigator and News Radar Items complete

• Timeline: End of Week 34 of 36
• Method: Seminar presentations via Zoom, DLT360 Navigator and News Radar Content Creation
• Activities: During this phase, we hold the final two seminars on the basis of the report, and provide evidence for the continuous creation of the Navigator and News Radar items during the duration of the Project

Milestone 8: Project completed

• Timeline: End of Week 36 of 36

• Method: Reporting

• Activities: As a last step, we establish the close-out report and the close-out video as required by the Catalyst guidelines

  [CAPABILITY/ FEASIBILITY] Please describe the deliverables, outputs and intended outcomes of each milestone.

Here we show the Deliverables, Acceptance Criteria and Evidence for our Milestones:

Milestone 1: Project, Processes & Team in place

• Deliverables: Project execution and communication framework
• Acceptance Criteria:

1.1) GitHub workspace and

1.2) Project Website-landing page created

1.3) Kickoff meeting held

• Evidence for 1.1), 1.2), 1.3): Short demonstration video

Milestone 2: Completion of Literature Review Phase

• Deliverables: Literature Study Chapter of report completed
• Acceptance Criteria:

2.1) At least 20 relevant sources reviewed, documented in bibliography

2.2) Report-chapter with description

• Evidence for 2.1), 2.2) : Short demonstration video

Milestone 3: Draft Report completed

• Deliverables: Draft of the complete report, including the conclusions and recommendations chapter
• Acceptance Criteria:

3.1) Draft of the Report with approx. 10,000 words available (no graphics included yet)

• Evidence for 3.1): Short demonstration video

Milestone 4: Primer and Presentations completed

• Deliverables: Public Primer (short document), Public Presentation (short), Training Presentation
• Acceptance Criteria:

4.1) Primer with short summary of the report (approx. 500 words)

4.2) Short Presentation (approx. 5 slides)

4.3) Training Presentation (approx. 30 slides)

• Evidence for 4.1), 4.2), 4.3): Short demonstration video

Milestone 5: Final Report completed

• Deliverables: Edited report by correcting and designing the visual aspects of the report, finalizing the report
• Acceptance Criteria:

5.1) Finalized report with approx. 10,000 words and graphics available

• Evidence for 5.1): Short demonstration video

Milestone 6: First Seminar held

• Deliverables: First of 3 seminars on the basis of the report created.
• Acceptance Criteria:

6.1) Seminar Recording

6.2) List of participants (probably anonymized due to GDPR requirements)

• Evidence for 6.1), 6.2) : Short demonstration video

Milestone 7: All Seminars held and Navigator and News Radar Items complete

• Deliverables: All 3 (online) seminars held, content for DLT360 Navigator and DLT360 News Radar Content created and integrated
• Acceptance Criteria:

7.1) Seminar Recording

7.2) List of participants (probably anonymized due to GDPR requirements)

7.3) 10+ DLT360 Navigator items integrated and functional

7.4) 10+ DLT360 News Radar items integrated and functional

• Evidence for 7.1) to 7.4) : Short demonstration video

Milestone 8: Project completed

• Deliverables: Official closing of the project according to Catalyst Guidelines
• Acceptance Criteria:

8.1) Close-out Report and

8.2) Close-out Video

• Evidence for 8.1) and 8.2): Official Closeout Report & Closeout Video according to Catalyst Guidelines

  [RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] Please provide a detailed budget breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

Budget Milestone 1: Initiate Project, Processes & Team

• Project & Team Kick-off (5 hours x 250 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Back office (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 2,500 ADA

Budget for Milestone 2: Completing Literature Review Phase

• Research (55 hours x 250 ADA = 13,750 ADA)
• Back office Assistance (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 15,000 ADA

Budget for Milestone 3: Draft Report

• Writing report draft (155 hours x 250 ADA = 38,750 ADA)
• Back office support (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 40,000 ADA

Budget for Milestone 4: Presentation slides completed

• Creating presentation (115 hours x 250 ADA = 28,750 ADA)
• Back office support (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 30,000 ADA

Budget for Milestone 5: Final Report Completed

• Completing Report Draft (155 hours x 250 ADA = 38,750 ADA)
• Back office support (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 40,000 ADA

Budget for Milestone 6: First Seminar held

• Plot and Design ( 25 hours x 250 ADA = 6,250 ADA)
• Presentation Production Lead (60 hours x 250 ADA = 15,000 ADA)
• Back office support (10 hours x 125 ADA = 1,250 ADA)
• Total: 22,500 ADA

Budget for Milestone 7: All Seminars held and Navigator and News Radar Items complete

• Video Production: (70 hours x 250 ADA = 17,500 ADA)
• Back office Support (20 hours x 125 ADA = 2,500 ADA)
• Total: 20,000 ADA

Budget for Milestone 8: Project completed

• Quality Checking and Reporting

• Infrastructure and tools-share for the project (CAPEX & OPEX)

• Total: 5,000 ADA

  [RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Project Lead

• Heinz Gassner, founder of DLT360 comes from 30+ years of experience in technology marketing and innovation leadership positions in renowned manufacturing companies. In addition to this, Heinz has education and experience in general business administration and regulatory matters and is just completing his latest M.Sc. in DLT/Blockchain at the University of Malta (with Dissertation in Decentralized Digital Identity area). Due to his long industry career, Heinz also has a strong personal network within the business and industry leadership community. Heinz has been engaged with CARDANO since 2017 and is an active player within the Catalyst community since the very first town hall. See LinkedIn

Senior Advisors

• Michiel Van Roey (Senior Advisor), Michiel van Roey is a senior Belgian/EU lawyer, co-founder & general counsel of Profila as well as senior advisor at DLT360. Michiel holds a Master of Law from the University of Antwerp, the University of Bern, and the University of Virginia School of Law. Michiel heads the Data Privacy Workstream within DLT360’s legal segment. See LinkedIn

• Maury Shenk (Senior Advisor), Maury Shenk is a senior lawyer and investor, as well as a senior advisor at DLT360. Formerly Managing Partner at an International Law Firm in London. Maury holds a B.A. from Harvard University and a J.D. from Stanford University. See LinkedIn

Legal and Policy Research

• Jonas Weinberger, co-founder of DLT360. Jonas has recently graduated from the Brussels School of Governance. Jonas is a regular contributor to DLT360’s legal workstream and is an active part of the DLT360 research team. Jonas is also our internal mastermind in design, presentation and video production. See LinkedIn

Project Management

• Guilherme Pereira, co-founder of DLT360, just completing his M.Sc. in Mechatronics in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Guilherme is active in our research team and is our program- and project management lead. See LinkedIn

Business and Industry Expert, Quality Control

• Thorsten Potebaum, co-founder and CTO of DLT360 is a very active player in the Cardano Catalyst community. Thorsten comes with a long industry experience in financial management, IT and cybersecurity (cybersecurity audit program manager). See LinkedIn

  [RESOURCES & VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

The following background is important for understanding our project-costing

• The DLT 360 Team is located in Europe, the UK and Brazil
• Europe-focused topics can be directly approached in Brussels
• Flexible on-demand access to experts in various disciplines (the DLT360 Domain Expert Team)
• Our Brazil location allows us to do intelligent and efficient cost-arbitration (back-office, project management, research assistance, design assistance and alike)