This proposal presented by the DripDropz team, aims to contribute to one of the main objectives of the challenge and Cardano in general, which is to increase the adoption of our blockchain, emerging as a very effective alternative to the current centralized solutions. It is based on the design of a mobile native marketplace that is easy to use for those who have no experience in cryptocurrencies or blockchain technologies, and that allows the exchange of goods (and, why not, services) in a multichain environment. The proposal clearly describes their interest in adding value to the ecosystem, bringing to the community a new Dapp that promises to achieve organic growth, due to the fact that it is intended to be used by small merchants, as well as by buyers inexperienced in crypto. Speaking of the target, while their audience is defined, what is not entirely clear to me, and what I recommend they elaborate on, is where they plan to launch their solution, as the impact may vary from one region to another or from one country to another. I say this both in terms of consumption, where a country with a higher spending and transaction volume of buying/selling goods in general may have a larger potential market, and I also remark this in terms of the current tenure, transactional volume and adoption of cryptoassets. It will not have the same potential, impact and probability of success (the latter I will discuss in the next rationale) to launch a prototype in a country with low household spending and low crypto transactions, than to do it in a country with high spending and volume. I recommend this at least for startup purposes, because it is clear that this solution has the potential to be scalable later on globally. Finally, I would also have liked to read in the proposal some metrics that allow you to quantitatively demonstrate the impact you expect to have on the community and its progress. With this kind of transparency, they will also be able to demonstrate what they have achieved when the time comes to apply for additional funding.

This is a proposal by the team behind the popular platform for distributing Cardano tokens, DripDropz, to create a multichain payment system that aims to integrate with consumers and real world businesses. The team states that they have already partnered with another company that will help them build this product (it would have been nice to know the name of this company, for transparency’s sake). As a risk, the team mentioned the fact that regulations will potentially be very dangerous for a project aiming to create a multichain payment method for cryptocurrencies. Whether the project succeeds or not, the potential impact this idea has is huge (I think of it as a sort of Paypal for crypto), so I think it definitely addresses the Dapps, Products & Integrations challenge. Score: 5.

Here is a super interesting use case for Cardano, which if successfully implemented would be one of the excellent uses cases for applications designed more on the side of RealFi. Briefly, this team intends to develop and implement a marketplace that will allow people to purchase products or services using tokens as a payment method. Allowing different types of businesses to offer their solutions to a much wider market, or simply diversify their payment methods. This seems very positive to me since it lowers the barrier of entry for the user, since the whole world of CEXs and DEXs may seem daunting, and will also add value to the ecosystem since it does not limit the types of products or services that can be offered on the platform, expanding the possibilities for mass adoption. In addition, I find it very positive that the features to expect from the MVP have been described in a manner that makes them easy for everyone to understand. This is very beneficial for the project because it defines clear limits in terms of what will be delivered. While I understand that this proposal focuses entirely on the technical aspects of the solution and Go-Live actions are not included in the scope, I would have liked to know which areas or countries will be addressed as part of the pilot phase, since one of the most difficult barriers must be regulatory, due to the nature of the solution. In spite of the fact that the purposes of this proposal are fully aligned with the challenge at hand, I believe that the impact metrics could have been described in a more concise manner. It only mentions how it will be communicated to the community and IOG in terms of progress reporting (which I think is very positive), but to make a better evaluation of the impact of the proposal it is necessary to offer more specific targets. For example, in a period of XX months we expect XX active users, XX monthly transactions or XX monthly sales volume. I realize that this is only an estimate, and there are many variables that can bring you closer or further away from those objectives, but given that you are requesting a considerable amount of funding, it would be interesting to know what your goals are.

The proposal has identified an important problem, and offered a proposed solution that is directly aligned with the challenge brief and the goal to bring impactful use cases to Cardano ecosystem that help drive adoption. By "Enabling easy access to Cardano and Cardano Native Assets for both buying and selling goods across a multichain environment." this proposal could significantly increase the use of Cardano by allowing users to transact and exchange real world products for crypto. It clearly will add value to Cardano by creating scalable infrastructure that will allow mass adoption of Ada purchases in an increasing number of stores and locations. The KPI's are directly related to increasing the number of the use cases and transactions on the cardano blockchain, and therefore aligned with the challenge goals.

If you don’t know about the DripDropz team, you don’t know Cardano. OK, I admit, that’s a centralized joke that is in contrast with our decentralized ethos. But truth be told, there are some players in our ecosystem who are well-known for their efforts to create a people-friendly blockchain from our cold open-source Cardano code. “ADA going for number one!” “Ada is a primary not an alt!” … OK, enough references to the DripDropz team – lets pick apart the proposal. The proposal wants to create a novel platform that will connect businesses and consumers who want to accept and spend ADA for products and services. Essentially, this proposal as envisaged seems to be fully in line with Cardano’s essential mission to become the financial operating system for the world and with most of the key Fund 9 goals – especially strategic goals 1 and 3. Essentially, the crux of the proposal is that the team will design and launch a MVP mobile application in flutter that will serve as an end-to-end marketplace for users with no cryptocurrency or blockchain experience. The team has identified one of the major problems for Cardano and blockchain environments in general – the lack of opportunity for spending cryptocurrencies and the lack of opportunity for earning it. Building bridges between the transactional players in a new age economic system. Perfect fit for Cardano’s expansion to the real world economy. The proposal does have a good view towards sustainability as the platform will serve as a facilitator for transactions, which provides ample opportunities for monetization.

This proposal includes a clear description of the problem, as well as a clear explanation of how the project intends to solve the stated problem. In it, they state clearly that their definition of success is to have a beta mobile app with full testnet functionality. Also, the characteristics that their MVP has to comply with are very well defined, in order to be able to audit whether or not they achieved their goal, such as: facilitate the completion of sales, allow all users to withdraw proceeds to the appropriate account or wallet, among others. It is possible to determine whether the proposal was fulfilled or not based on the MVP and the mentioned characteristics; however, it is not possible to determine if the proposal was successful based on them. To audit success, I would like to suggest the team to incorporate into the project some KPIs such as: number of active daily/weekly/monthly users, total number of users, number of transactions performed, total value of the transactions performed, number of products available in the marketplace, total value of the products available in the marketplace, etc. To conclude, I would like to highlight that the team is considering reporting to Catalyst on a monthly basis the progress of the project with completion percentages, which reflects the transparency that the team wishes to demonstrate by making these regular updates available, so that they can be audited by the community.

The team is committing to presenting monthly reports to Catalyst with the progress they have, which will definitely help with the auditability of the proposal. Please consider adding not only % completion numbers to these reports, but also small demos / presentations of available features / content, as that will greatly boost the confidence of the community in what is being done here (and hence help you obtain future funding). Success for the project is defined as having a beta Mobile app with full testnet functionality of the above listed milestones. This is very clear and it will be possible for anyone in the Cardano ecosystem to verify that what was promised was delivered. I think the information here is sufficient to help the community audit the proposal. Good luck with the project, it sounds very exciting! Score: 5.

One element that is particularly well presented is the problem and the way the proposed solution addresses it; here it is evident that the experience of the team has been put to good use. Additionally, a great job has been done in defining the features of the minimum viable product, which can be viewed as the main milestones. This provides transparency to the community, as well as setting out that the definition of success would be to have the beta version of the application with all the MVP features. What could have been better explained was the roadmap, since the way the proposal was drafted, it is impossible to know when the first version of the MVP would be ready for use in the testnet, although the major development areas and estimated contracting time are described, it is not clear whether they will be interdependent. As for the metrics section, it only mentions communication and reporting channels with the community, thus, it seems necessary to establish some success / failure criteria. A recommendation for this MVP would include (1) number of downloads of the beta app, (2) amount of feedback received, (3) rating of the beta app, (4) percentage of active users, and (5) amount of transactions in beta.

The proposer has included key milestones to track, and the project manager will prepare and submit monthly reports to Catalyst with % completed on the milestones listed. They have defined success as the delivery of the specific milestones listed below: -Allow merchants to list physical or virtual products for sale. -Provide a seamless onramp for new customers to fund wallets. -Facilitate the completion of sales. -Allow all users to withdraw proceeds to the appropriate account or wallet. -Manage and track the results of sales for the merchant and customer.

It will not be difficult for the Catalyst community to audit these clear milestones/features once the project is completed, and audit by checking the supplied progress reports during development.

The team states that they will use a combination of git and trello to manage the project's progress, which is excellent in terms of transparency. The proposal states that the project manager will prepare and submit the monthly reports to Catalyst with percent completed on the milestones listed. However, I think that the team could have committed – for the requested amount of funding – a more accessible public channel for delivering regular updates to the community for auditing progress. The amount of requested funding is of $326,000 and for this amount a dedicated fortnightly or monthly technical progress report on the DripDropz site and social media channels would work wonders for keeping the wider Cardano and Catalyst community excited and onboard. The monthly reports to Catalyst – seem to be the bare minimum – and I would advise the team (if not funded in this round) to take a more comprehensive approach to updates, so that the community can be engaged more fully. The monthly reports to Catalyst are buried among hundreds of other reports in Google Docs/Sheets formats and are user-unfriendly. The minimum feature set for the MVP product includes very specific features such as: “Allow merchants to list physical or virtual products for sale”… “Provide a seamless onramp for new customers to fund wallets” and “Facilitate the completion of sales”… among others. These are valid metrics for the success of the project and an early engagement with the community through the DripDropz social media channels could help the team to tweak the MVP product as they go along – taking on board suggestions from the community.