Support for blockchain technology is coming from world wide organizations. The UNICEF Innovation Fund has recently announced that they are looking to make $50-90K equity-free investments to provide early stage (seed) finance to for-profit technology start-ups that have the potential to benefit humanity.
The announcement says,
"We are interested in companies that use distributed ledger tech in new, groundbreaking, ways that are scalable, and globally applicable. If you are aligned with our general criteria, we want to hear from you."
The UNICEF Innovation Fund is willing to invest in a group of companies developing software solutions on open blockchains such as Smart Contract, Analyzing data, Tokens, Mining etc., The aim is to guide these technologies in a way that helps children and society.
Smart Contracts
- Using smart contracts to replicate and improve on existing organizational mechanisms
- Efficiencies, transparencies, and accountabilities in contractual engagements (i.e. multi-sig contracts that guarantee certain actors were involved)
- Transparency in distribution of resources (can we better show where our money is going?)
- Interactions across groups (what would a SWIFT code for development look like, if described in Solidity?)
- Increasing access and use of tokenized systems by creating more user friendly and more secure interfaces
Analyzing data
- Using machine learning to understand the activities on public blockchains.
- Can we develop unicity from transactions on public blockchains?
- Could we use crypto-flows to help organizations and governments do and understand their transactions more efficiently? Can we use blockchain data to solve humanitarian challenges?
Tokens
- Can crypto tokens work to incentivize or support behavior that benefits humanity?
- How could we connect various tokens to each other to maximize human potential?
- How could we utilize digital scarcity, non-fungible tokens, or digital collectibles for social good?
Mining
Can we use passive distributed mining networks to create investment funding opportunities for the UNICEF Venture Fund?
The funding is not necessarily limited to the above. If you’ve got a start-up registered in one of UNICEF’s programme countries and have a working, open source prototype (or you are willing to make it open-source) showing promising results, the UNICEF Innovation Fund is looking for you.
How to apply?
– go to www.unicefinnovationfund.org
– Click on ‘Submit’ and then ‘Submissions by Start-ups’.
When to apply?
The submissions deadline is on 11:59 EST February 28th, 2018. Application will be reviewed and only shortlisted companies will be contacted and then requested to submit a more in-depth proposal.
UNICEF Innovation Fund is willing to help with seed funding, product and technology development, business growth, data networks & platforms, and maximize impact. As the world’s leading organisation for children, UNICEF has a network of experts and partners across its Country Offices who can provide geographically localized advice and partnerships needed to reach more users.
This is not the first time, UNICEF is supporting blockchain technology. Previous year, UNICEF Innovation Fund in association with Govt. of South African started a project Amply – Amplify the benefit. This project uses mobile and Ethereum blockchain technology to increase impact and accountability of public services and generate real-time data. It is a protocol that provide every child with their own self-sovereign digital identity based on the blockchain. Read more about this project here.
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