Annual Report 2022

Contents

Who we are
The Cardano Foundation is anindependent, Swiss-based
not-for-profit organization. We aretasked with advancing the public
digital infrastructure Cardano.
02

03. Our Mission
04. Core Focus Areas
05. A note from our CEO
08. Executive Summary
10. Cardano Statistics
11. Operational Resilience
14. Education
17. Adoption
21. The Cardano Summit 2022
25. Financial Summary
The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Our Mission
The Cardano Foundation works to anchor 		
the Cardano infrastructure as a utility for
financial and social systems, thus empowering
the digital architects of the future.
The Foundation facilitates the worldwide
advancement of Cardano in enterpriseapplications. We develop infrastructure
tooling - including where there may not be
an immediate commercial use case - plus
strengthen operational resilience, and drive
diversity of on-infrastructure use cases aswell as the development of sound andrepresentative governance.
Another significant part of our mission isto engage with and support the Cardano
community. The Foundation assists thedevelopment of tools the community can
use to leverage Cardano to solve problems
in new ways.

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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Core Focus Areas
04

Operational Resilience

Education

Adoption

Ensure a robust and reliable Cardano 		infrastructure.

Contribute to blockchain education 		and regulatory clarity.

Create the conditions for increased
blockchain utility.

The Foundation is dedicated to bolstering 		Cardano’s technological resilience and 		
preparing the infrastructure to be an 		enterprise critical technology.

The Foundation serves a crucial role in 		
fostering discussion and debate, supporting
research, plus actively explaining blockchain
and decentralization to various stakeholders.

The Foundation aims to increase the use ofblockchain by businesses, organizations, andother institutions across the globe, while also
fostering the open source maturity of theecosystem.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

A Note From Our CEO
When I first came onboard as CEO in
2020, it was a crucial moment for the
Cardano Foundation. Cardano as adigital infrastructure had matured, andso the time had arrived for the Foundation to step into its true role, not only
supporting the community but also pushing infrastructure adoption.
Now, almost three years later, wehave established an environment ofresponsibility, welcoming to individuals
and organizations alike who value
reliable relations. We have a long-term
strategy that can stand the test of timeand build the Cardano Foundation as anorganization that will both encourage
ecosystem growth, plus increase
enterprise adoption.
The Foundation has a mandate tochampion new technologies in the digital
infrastructure space. We envision aworld where the technological infrastructures are made for transparency andaccountability, so that all stakeholders
can easily verify their interactions within
any system. Only in this way can we help
improve the lives of all.

The Cardano Foundation knows theimportance of inclusive governance. In
fact, I have witnessed it first hand. During
my years in University I had an amazing
lecture on commodity trading. It soinspired me that, even though I was astudent on a tight budget, I immediately
walked to the local bank looking to tradein commodities. The incredulous reactionof that bank clerk made me hunt foranswers, and I eventually realized theworld remains quite divided between thevery selected few with plenty of access toopportunities and the many with little tono say in most things. We need systems
that consider everyone and take into
account the voices, experience, andinsights of all. Together, by working intandem and collaborating with eachother, we can really accomplish
marvelous improvements.
Indeed, the Foundation’s achievements
could never happen without theunrelenting work of our teams. We grewfrom less than forty employees at the
beginning of 2022 to almost eighty by lastDecember, and I am incredibly proud ofFrederik Gregaard,
05
05

CEO, Cardano Foundation

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

what the entire Cardano Foundation has 		accomplished in just one year. So it brings me 		great joy to present the Cardano Foundation’s firstannual report. It looks back on our achievements
throughout 2022, while also allowing us to share
our current focuses and goals.
In 2022 alone, the Foundation provided technicalassistance in the lead-up to the Vasil hard fork,
established the basis for a nation-wide use of 		blockchain in the supply chain of Georgian wine,and contributed to showcasing the versatility of
NFTs. Their scope remains fascinating, ranging
from the artistic to the utilitarian. Just think of thecontrast between the aesthetic imagination of Etter
Edition and the verification purposes for whichveritree employs NFTs.
This diversity of transactions and solutions acrossthe network matters. It shows vitality and ensuresdurability. I love to see how the range of tools,
solutions, and products built by the community
keeps on blossoming in number and variety. To
not just acknowledge but also encourage it, theFoundation updated its delegation strategy toreward stake pool operators (SPOs) who
again and again develop the tools others
rely on to build on Cardano. We also
worked on tuning the process for the
Cardano Improvement Proposals(CIPs), so that it now aligns with thebest open source practices, andwe launched the first Annual

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These achievements
move us closer to our
long-term mission:
contribute to providing
the world with open
and decentralized
infrastructures thatit can depend on.

State of the Cardano Developer Ecosystem survey
to map tools, identify gaps, and help us direct ourefforts.
Add it all up together and each and every one ofthese steps moves us closer to our long-term
mission: contribute to providing the world with
open and decentralized infrastructures that it
can depend on. To do so, the Cardano Foundation
functions under the three core focus areas ofoperational resilience, education, and adoption.
They constantly interact and support each other.
Adoption increases on-chain utility and ensures
the future of blockchain, but it simultaneously
requires that others understand the technology
and that the technology itself remains reliable,robust, and fit for mission-critical applications.
The Cardano Summit 2022, the first organized 		by the Foundation, combined these various goals
and commitments. We specifically designed it toempower the community and stir curiosity, to bringthe ecosystem together and invite new enthusiasts.
The sessions covered numerous topics, providing
information as well as insights, and the event 		
spanned the globe, gathering people from all
aspects of blockchain, those who together ensure
the operational resilience of the chain, plus theones who might birth the next innovation or takeblockchain further into the off-chain world.
Various teams within the Cardano Foundation are
already abuzz preparing the Summit 2023. Others
remain involved in multiple projects that not only

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

contribute to the open source maturity of the ecosystem but
also address different perspectives, opinions, and needs. And
yet others keep close contact with the community as Cardano
fully enters the age of Voltaire, our governance phase.
Although we as an organization will not continue to expand ourteam at a similar rhythm, our goals remain equally ambitious.
Building on the momentum of 2022, we have already madesignificant progress in 2023.
The Alpha Program of our blockchain course has gone live.
We will use the feedback from the numerous participants tocreate a better learning experience and provide trustworthy,
high quality blockchain education, free for everyone. At the sametime, the Foundation is preparing a series of technical enablers
that will create much needed bridges between blockchain andthe current financial and social systems.
Cardano offers a scalable, dependable option that works to solve
the blockchain trilemma. The Cardano Foundation hopes moreindividuals, institutions, and organizations can realize the potentialof blockchain, joining us on this journey as blockchain citizens.
An emphatic thank you to everyone involved in the Cardano
community, to those who reach out with suggestions, whoprovide criticism, who participate in the ecosystem. Please do
not hesitate to get in touch with comments or questions throughany of our social channels.
Finally, a warm welcome to anyone considering joining Cardano.
We would be happy to have you onboard. And if you are new tothe world of blockchain, we will gladly assist and support you.
This is a road we walk together.
See you soon,
Frederik Gregaard
07

The
The Cardano
Cardano Foundation
Foundation Annual
Annual Review
Report 2022

Executive Summary
The Cardano Foundation worked throughout 2022 to achieve its overarching 		
mission to ensure the advancement of Cardano and contribute to the success of 		blockchain as a technology for qualitative change. We made significant progress 		
across our three core focus areas: of operational resilience, education and adoption.

Operational resilience
In 2022, the Cardano Foundation continued to provide technical assistance 		in updating and maintaining the robustness and reliability of the Cardano
infrastructure. Some of the highlights include the release of thedecentralized application backend (DAB) solution and the expansion of
the Developer Portal, which equips the technical community witha wider range of options and tools to build solutions.
The technical support provided by the Foundation was essential
for the success of the Vasil hard fork and the strengthening of the
Cardano Improvement Proposal (CIP) process. The latter enables
the Cardano community to collaborate on problems, propose 		
solutions, and record changes.

Education
Increased understanding of what blockchain			
is, how it works, and what it can and cannot
do is essential for the adoption of Cardano
as a public digital infrastructure. In 2022
our team engaged with policymakers,
businesses, students, and the general public.
The Foundation not only collaborated with
universities but also participated in highlevel policy discussions with representatives
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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

from Brussels, Singapore, Switzerland, the United Kingdom,
and the United States of America, as well as with membersof the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and the World
Bank. Through events, podcasts, interviews, blogs, and social
media, our team interacted with all corners of the Cardano
community, listening and learning even while sharing ideas
and updates with the people who make Cardano thrive. In
addition, during 2022 we started building a new blockchain
education course, with the Alpha Program already launchedin the first quarter of 2023. The entire course will later be madeavailable online. All such efforts contribute to advance a deeper
and more accurate understanding of blockchain technology.

Adoption
The Foundation also works to foster adoption through targeted partnerships with 		various enterprises, international institutions, government agencies, environmental NGOs,
and leading universities. In 2022 this involved landmark partnerships and collaborations
with Switzerland for UNHCR, the Georgia National Wine Agency, veritree, and the Universityof Zurich. Additionally, based on extensive community outreach and input, we also helped
to develop and launch a range of tools designed to facilitate adoption and assist Cardano toscale. These include tools such as Kupo v2 and Ogmios, plus our support for the integrationof various forensic tools.
The highlight of the year was of course the Cardano Summit. By placing the community
at the heart of the agenda the Foundation sparked a Summit like no other, with over
50 locations worldwide, ranging from numerous international community-led events
to a gathering in Lausanne, with a total of over 30,000 participants. The event played
host to diverse and informative sessions over two days in November. It became a truly
community-curated event, with the Foundation’s Cardano Ballot providing a mechanism
for attendees to vote on various aspects of the agenda.
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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Cardano Statistics
As of 31 December 2022

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Wallets

Plutus scripts

Delegated wallets

3.83 million

4,705

1.25 million

Total assets minted

Native assets minted (Jan - Dec 2022)

7,431,265

4,775,817

Stake pools

Total transactions

Staked3,220

57.9 million

71%
The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Operational
Resilience
Ensuring a robust and reliable
Cardano blockchain.

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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Developer Portal

Delegation to Stake Pool 			Operators (SPO)

The Developer Portal assists all those buildingon the Cardano ecosystem, leading to greater
participation on-chain and thus increasing theoperational resilience of the Cardano infrastructure.
The builder tools section expanded from 19
available tools in January 2022 to 62 in December.
Facilitating cooperation across the Cardanotechnology stack encourages innovation anddelivers benefits to a bigger part of the community.

Delegation allows ada users to delegate the stakeassociated with their ada to a stake pool, a Cardano
node that holds the combined stake of multiple
participants giving them an added opportunity tocontribute to the network’s security and maintenance.
As the Cardano ecosystem and infrastructure
continues to evolve, the delegation methodologyof the Cardano Foundation as regards its ada must
develop in tandem. We adjusted the process ofdelegation to stake pool operators in 2021 to shift
the focus to supporting the people who forge tools
and create value on Cardano.

During 2022, the Foundation also built out the
showcase section of the Portal, enabling developers
to present to a wider audience the projects they
currently have running on mainnet. There were
63 such showcase projects in January 2022,
expanding to 104 projects by December. Similarly,
the developer spotlights provide an in-depth lookat some of the exciting projects in the Cardano
ecosystem and the people behind them.

88

Contributors inJanuary 2022

161

Contributors in
December 2022

83%
Increase

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Testnet for UZH
The testnet for the University of Zurich,established by the Cardano Foundation in 2022,
will deliver a better understanding of the
Cardano infrastructure and ecosystem, while
spreading knowledge on proof-of-stake systems.

Elevating these operators has helped to foster aculture of community-driven development andcollaboration, and move from a more coincidental
approach to one better attuned to what thecommunity needs. We aim to ensure that more
open source solutions are created that will aid theecosystem in growing stronger.

Integration Support for Exchanges
The Cardano Foundation provided technical 		support for the integration of ada onto over twelve
different exchanges in 2022, including Coinberry,
WealthSimple, Bitget, and Bitrue

The project with UZH aims to provide greater
insight into the use of blockchain technology
across a variety of sectors.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Decentralized Application Backend (DAB)

Cardano Improvement Proposals (CIP)

The launch of the decentralized application
backend (DAB) solution by the Cardano Foundationand EMURGO brought several benefits to Cardano’s
developer community. Chief among them is theability for developers to easily deploy a decentralized
application to interact with smart contracts on
Cardano. This also increases the range of options
for developers to build solutions.

A Cardano Improvement Proposal (CIP) is aformalized design document for the Cardano
community. A community-driven component of thegovernance pipeline, CIPs help to organize andcatalog thoughts and technical proposals. The
Foundation intends the CIPs to become the primarymechanisms for proposing new features andcollecting community input on an issue, with a viewto encouraging a community-led ecosystem.

The DAB will also enable apps and wallets to connect
to Cardano without a full node, ensuring fasterand more flexible integrations. During the AnnualState of the Cardano Developer Ecosystem survey,
the community voted the DAB as one of the services
most used by developers, in large part due to theway it facilitates third party development ofapplications, and ultimately simplifies interactions
with the Cardano infrastructure. For more on theDeveloper Survey, see page 20.

In 2022, the Cardano Foundation reworked andimproved the CIP process to address gaps that
had arisen since its inception. In order to aid thisprocess, we participated in regular CIP meetingsand designated a full-time CIP editor. Additionally,
the Foundation helped transition CIP meetings from
Crowdcast to Discord and remains active inassisting to develop the structure of these meetings,
which provides the community with a space fordiscussions.

Catalyst Voting
Any blockchain ecosystem requires a diverse and varied range of actors to ensure lasting vibrancy. Consequently,
the Cardano Foundation has become an active participant in Project Catalyst since Fund 7.
Project Catalyst acts as a prelude to on-chain governance in the Cardano ecosystem by allowing thecommunity to self-determine priorities for growth. The Foundation’s participation reflects our support for
innovation, collaboration, and diversity of values and opinions. As of October 2022, Project Catalyst hadreceived and processed over 6.1 thousand proposals, reached over 1.7 million votes, and funded around
1,200 projects, including 800 in 2022 alone. As part of the process to date, each funding round consists ofspecific challenges that proposals attempt to solve. The Foundation votes on Project Catalyst challenges with
14.5 million ada. We prioritize projects developing Cardano’s core infrastructure as well as those building
bridges and aiming to do good at scale.
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THE

Vasil
Hard-ForkIn September 2022, using Cardano’s hardfork combinator (HFC), the Vasil hard fork
merged the previous protocol with the latest
one, ushering in the Basho phase. The
Foundation’s Integration team played acritical role in obtaining the necessary
information on how third parties interact
with the infrastructure, plus provided
technical assistance to exchanges and otherthird parties, keeping them up to speed on any
technical news and tracking the progressof upgrades.
Named after Vasil St. Dabov, a much-loved
Cardano community member, the update
increased decentralization and introduced
new functionalities. Among other things, it
provided upgrades to network capacity as
well as to Plutus, Cardano’s smart contract
programming language. These changes
primarily focused on the decentralized
application (DApp) development on Cardano.
Vasil will boost optimization, support
applications’ growth, and increase the
network’s throughput. In time, this will further
strengthen the developer community.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Education
Contributing to blockchain
education and regulatory clarity.

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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

20+ Events Attended

Regulatory Engagement

For many organizations, public permissionless blockchain remains an emerging and misunderstood form of
infrastructure. The Cardano Foundation is committed to
explaining its numerous advantages. Our participation inworkshops and group discussions about the significanceof blockchain and Trade Tech applications at the World
Economic Forum (WEF) reached a host of new stakeholders.
As the only participating industry representatives, it 		proved particularly fruitful in spreading awareness of
Cardano and its value proposition.

In 2022, among other responses toregulatory consultations, the Cardano
Foundation engaged with the Financial
Stability Board’s consultation on theinternational regulation of crypto-asset
activities. In our response, we advocatedfor an adequate, risk-based legal andregulatory framework, built on sensible
and suitable principles that will bebeneficial to realizing the potentialof both digital assets and blockchain
technology.

Throughout 2022, the Foundation continued education
efforts on the potential of blockchain and its applications,engaging with stakeholders to share expertise and clarify
concepts. Team members from the Foundation attended
over 20 events across the globe, facilitating and participating
in a range of conferences, panels, and debates.
The Foundation’s panel dedicated to women in Blockchain,
held in Zurich last July, highlighted a range of female voicesin the space and discussed how blockchain offers theopportunity to create a truly inclusive global operating
system. As the Foundation noted at the event “Blockchain,
Crypto, and Philanthropy”, transparency and trust underpin
this inclusiveness. The Cardano Foundation also delivered
the keynote address at the “Upbit Developer Conference”,
which focused on smart contracts and how Cardano canbe used for product certification and proof of origin.
In other 2022 events, the Foundation addressed topics such as
how the Cardano infrastructure can upgrade philanthropy
and help the world to achieve its climate goals, blockchain’s
utility for economic sustainability, and the specific benefitsof the Cardano infrastructure and ecosystem.
15

The Foundation also interacted with
policymakers across the globe. From
London to Brussels to Singapore, ourteam explained the potential ofblockchain and the advantages of the
Cardano infrastructure as well as of its
ecosystem.
While attending the Blockchain for
Europe Summit in Brussels, teammembers of the Foundation met with
policymakers and stakeholders,
advocating for evidence-led blockchain
regulation and highlighting thetechnology’s potential use cases.
In addition, we chaired roundtables at
the Singapore Fintech Festival, hosting
leaders from governments, central
banks, and businesses.
The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

UZH Partnership

Blockchain Education

In 2022 the Cardano Foundation launched athree-year sponsorship of a PhD position inblockchain analytics at the University of
Zurich (UZH), a natural extension of
Cardano’s academic heritage as the first
blockchain infrastructure founded on
peer-reviewed research and developedwith evidence-based methods.

During the Cardano Summit 2022, theFoundation announced a comprehensive
blockchain education course, with the Alpha
Program just launched in Q1 2023. The fullcourse will cover a variety of subjects, suchas blockchain fundamentals and generations,
cryptography, structure and components,
consensus algorithms, and Cardano
specificities. It will provide in-depth training
to those interested in blockchain technology.

Our relationship with UZH had alreadybegun in 2021 when we participated intheir International Blockchain Summer
School. We contributed to the Summer
School again in 2022 to encourage further
exploration of blockchain use cases.
As part of the three-year partnership, theCardano Foundation also established aresearch collaboration with the University’s
Blockchain and Distributed Ledger
Technologies Group (BDLT). The BDLT will
provide tools for the Foundation to further
promote governance principles on Cardano
with a focus on consensus protocols.
Furthermore, it will perform an extensive
study of the economics, incentives, andscalability of projects on the Cardano 		infrastructure.

16

With content created and reviewed by experts,
the course will offer information in sessionsorganized to accommodate different learning
styles. The program will progressively allow
students to move from beginner to advanced
blockchain knowledge.

Swiss Digital Asset Market 		
Report 2022
The Foundation proudly took on the double
role of partner to and participant in the Swiss
Digital Asset Market Report in 2022. The
report highlighted the growth of the sector in
Switzerland and showcased how innovationfriendly policies can create and provide legal
certainty to burgeoning businesses. We hopethat this report will inspire business leadersand policymakers to better cater for and growa qualitative blockchain sector.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Adoption
Creating the conditions forincreased blockchain utility.

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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Cardano Ballot

Switzerland for UNHCR

Developed by the Foundation’s Metadata Tools teamin collaboration with SundaeSwap, the Cardano Ballot
arose within the larger scope of the Summit 2022. It
provided the Cardano community with a way to votefor speakers and award nominees, guaranteeing thatevery vote had on-chain verification. The “one person,
one vote” approach ensured each vote had an equal
weight, giving those with fewer funds, or even empty
wallets, the same voting weight as those with more
substantial amounts of ada in their wallets.

The Foundation designs its
Global Impact Challenges tounite the Cardano ecosystem
in creating a broad positive
impact, while also highlighting
the unique possibilities of the
Cardano infrastructure. In thisStake delegation to Switzerland for UNHCR
spirit, we launched the second
to support forcibly displaced people
Impact Challenge at last year’s
Cardano Summit, this time with
the UN Refugee Agency’s national partner in Switzerland.

Alongside the Ballot, the team also developed a new
open source Wallet Connector. Although designed for
the Summit 2022, this Cardano Foundation solution
serves the large ecosystem. It created an open
source connector that diminishes the amount of work
developers have to perform in order to connect andauthenticate a Cardano wallet. The team also madeavailable two extra repositories for open source
signature verification, and the Ballot itself will be
refactored into an open source library, giving others
the possibility to further refine it and to deploy it fordifferent uses.

3.5 million ada

The project takes an innovative approach to the use of blockchain
for philanthropy. Instead of the usual crypto-philanthropy approach
where donors make direct crypto donations to a charity, thecollaboration between the Foundation and Switzerland for UNHCR
establishes the possibility for continuous support. Ada holders candelegate to a stake pool and any potential reward from the stake pool
will automatically go towards supporting Switzerland for UNHCR’s
mission. In this way, Switzerland for UNHCR may receive long-term
support, and donors can continually help while still keeping their
original delegated stake.
The official launch of the charity stake pool WRFGS happened in
January 2023 at the “Blockchain for Good” conference in Davos. The
Cardano Foundation made the initial delegation to the stake pool with
3.5 million ada. Taurus, a leading infrastructure provider, operates
the pool.
The UNHCR’s Innovation Programme will receive 20% of the stake
pool rewards, while the remaining 80% will fund on the ground
missions supporting forcibly displaced people.

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Ball tForensic Tools 		
Integration
Blockchain forensic tools are an
emerging technology that help
to combat cyber and financial
crime. They prove crucial inrecovering and analyzing
evidence of hacks, thefts,
ransoms, and sanctions evasion.
In 2022 alone, the Cardano
Foundation supported theintegration of six forensic
providers: Blockchain Intelligence
Group, CoinFirm, Alethea,
Scorechain, Merkle Science,
and TRM Labs. These tools
provide access to businessand regulatory information in
the areas of digital forensics,
anti-money laundering (AML),
and know your customer (KYC).
Understanding and highlighting
how blockchain technology
can mitigate risk, increase
operational efficiency, and play arole in the fight against financial
crime becomes an important stepfor wider adoption.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

veritree Progress

OgmiosThe Cardano Foundation’s first Global Impact 		
Challenge called on the community to contributeada in order to plant one tree for every ada donated.
In return, donors received a token record ofownership for each tree they sponsored. Ultimately,over 1 million ada was given to veritree, a
global land and tree restoration enterprise.

Over the past year, the Cardano
Foundation supported the development
and maintenance of Ogmios, alightweight bridge interface tool. Ogmios
has facilitated access to the Cardano
infrastructure by giving users theopportunity to build on Cardano inprogramming languages beyond
Haskell. Ogmios provides a more
approachable interface (JSON over
WebSocket or HTTP) than the bespoke
Cardano’s client protocols, which for along time have required developers toknow and write in Haskell.

Owing to the transparency and traceability offeredby Cardano, the data becomes permanent,
immutable, and accessible. GPS coordinates,
photos, and other specific information are easily
stored and shared via Verified Land Restoration
NFTs. Consumers can observe their tree’s growthand verify their donation at all times. 125,000 trees
redeemable on the Cardano blockchain wereplanted in Kenya to celebrate 2022’s Earth Day
in April, with a total of 350,000 trees alreadyplanted in the Cardano Forest to date.

350,000
19

trees planted

Ogmios also supports all the features
introduced by the Vasil hard fork andhas already had significant use
throughout 2022. In particular, thecommunity has developed several client
libraries in different languages, like
TypeScript, Go, Java, and Kotlin among
others. They make interacting with
Ogmios, and thus with Cardano’s nodes,
even more straightforward.

Memorandum of Understanding with 		the Georgian Government
In 2022, the Cardano Foundation partnered with Georgia’s
National Wine Agency, the Bolnisi Winemakers Association,and Scantrust to leverage the Cardano infrastructure in
the production, promotion, and reach of Georgian wine.
The pilot programme will involve the production of
100,000 bottles of wine, using grapes harvested inAutumn of 2022. Each bottle will come equipped with alabel that includes a unique and secure QR code, allowing
consumers to verify the authenticity and provenance of
the wine. The National Wine Agency will use Cardano tocreate public and verifiable records of wine certification
data.
Designed to increase trust in Georgian wine, the scopeof the Cardano Foundation’s track-and-trace solution willgo from 20 wineries and 200,000 total bottles to 8,000
wineries and 25 million bottles by 2032.

100,000
bottles will be verified on Cardano

Developer Ecosystem Survey

Etter Edition 01

Kupo v2

Last year marked the inaugural Annual State of
the Cardano Developer Ecosystem survey. It
comprised 31 questions with the aim of gathering
information to provide an accurate perception of
key target-areas for improvement. Additionally, thesurvey’s findings will assist the efficient planningand coordination of open source effort amongst
builders, so as to promote effective collaborations
that can further strengthen the ecosystem.

The Cardano Foundation facilitated the launch ofEtter Edition 01, a showcase of the potential at theintersection of blockchain technology and art.

2022 saw the rollout of Kupo v2. Developed by theOpen Source team at the Cardano Foundation,
Kupo is a lightweight chain-indexing solution,
providing fast access to and filtering of blockchain
data. Kupo indexes elements of the chain in a 		database and provides a high-level interface(JSON over HTTP) to retrieve the indexed data easily
and efficiently. It is a crucial component for many
decentralized applications that need access tohistorical information.

The results of this survey are open source andfreely available for supplementary analysis. They
will continue to help in determining which libraries
and tools prove critical to the Cardano ecosystem,
while also allowing the Foundation to discern
gaps in available tools or libraries. It will similarly
aid in pinpointing possible deficiencies in existing
solutions. Going forward, we plan to conduct annual
surveys to evaluate what has been accomplished,
what worked, and which areas may still require
attention.

20

Developed as a hybrid physical and NFT generativeart project, the Etter Edition 01 came as aco-creation by Christian Etter and Alexander E.
Brunner. Swiss based Web3 infrastructure provider
NMKR minted the NFTs themselves, which are
redeemable as physical pieces of art on the
Cardano infrastructure.
In addition to the artistic talent, the project
highlighted how Cardano can facilitate the creationof NFTs with advanced metadata features.

Five Binaries (Blockfrost), SundaeSwap,
cexplorer.io, jpeg.store, and others now use Kupo
V2 in production - a testament to its utility for users
across the Cardano ecosystem.

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Cardano
Summit 2022

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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Cardano Summit
From Ho Chi Minh City to São Paulo, the Cardano
Summit 2022 was a global celebration, with a mainstage event in Lausanne, community-led events 		
spanning most continents, a virtual Summit Lodge,
and a grand total of more than 50 locations and over
30,000 participants overall. A true testament to thereach of the Cardano community.
The Foundation’s Cardano Ballot provided a
community-driven mechanism for selecting the day
2 speakers and helping to shape the agenda. It further
allowed the community to vote on, and consequently
decide the winners of the inaugural Cardano Summit
Awards.
In taking on the organization of last year’s Summit,
the Foundation immediately decided to embrace thespirit of decentralization and governance. We wanted
to boost community input, celebrate those building
Cardano and on Cardano, plus encourage theecosystem evolution. Consequently, we ensured theorganization of workshops along our themes coveringa variety of topics like marketing strategies, regulatory
and tax considerations, or monitoring and metrics.
Day 1 of the Summit began with over 20 sessions
and 45 speakers. From proof of stake and finance toopen source principles and blockchain for good, theSummit encompassed the most relevant discussions
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The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

happening in the field of blockchain and approached some alternative possibilities toexisting problems. It equally served as a stage for several announcements. The day closedwith the inaugural Cardano Summit Awards.
Continuing the momentum, day 2 offered presentations as well as panel discussions
addressing topics like digital identity, finance, brands, or gaming. Day 2 speakers werevoted for and chosen by the community itself, using a previous selection of candidates also
nominated by the community. The day concluded with a closing party, where those present
on the ground in Lausanne joined together to close out the Cardano Summit for 2022.
Many participants highlighted that the Cardano Summit stood out among blockchainrelated conferences due to the density of attendees building to make a real difference inthe world.

23

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

Be
n,
rm
Ge
y
an

30,000+rli

Cardano Summit Across the World

40+
Sessions

Attendees

44,000+6,000+

Registrations forcommunity events

80+
Speakers
24

50+
GlobalLogins forvirtual events

15+
Workshops

locationsBangkok, Thailand

Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso

The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022

June 2022

Dec 2022

Financial Summary$45m

Cash & cash
equivalents
(11%)

$322m

ADA (81%)

In 2022, the Cardano Foundation significantly increased its 		
headcount and associated costs, with a view to support its 		increased activities around operation resilience, education, 		
adoption, and open source.
In order to ensure the funding of its strategic objectives, the 		
Cardano Foundation Treasury applies a conservative approach thatguarantees sufficient resources at all times, in particular in the caseof a bear market.
The Cardano Foundation was able to build a significant liquidity
buffer, allowing it to support its current level of activities for morethan 2 years. The increase in the non-crypto proposition of theTreasury has been funded mainly via the sale of ada rewards and Bitcoin into short term placements with low credit risk.

$48mCash & cash
equivalents
(21%)

$166m

ADA (71%)

The Foundation was not directly affected by industry risk events
throughout 2022. The Cardano Foundation allocates its assets torobust counterparties.

$31m

BTC (8%)The Foundation predominantly holds its ada (ADA) and Bitcoin (BTC)
in cold storage solutions. A portion of the assets are held with Swiss
crypto custodians and Swiss banks.
The 2022 year-end audit for the Cardano Foundation will be 		
conducted by Grant Thornton and will conclude in May 2023.

Market value of
assets: $398m (100%)
25

$19m

BTC (8%)Market value of
assets: $233m (100%)
The Cardano Foundation Annual Report 2022