Managing partner of Dragonfly, Haseeb Qureshi, believes that the Zcash development fund (Dev Fund) should not be extended after the current funding model concludes in 2028. However, he does not propose stopping support in the coming years; in his opinion, funds are still needed to complete major technical projects. Among the priorities, Qureshi named Tachyon, enhancing the protocol's resilience to quantum attacks, and further expanding formal verification. After completing these tasks, he believes that development funding can transition to voluntary contributions from ZEC holders and other ecosystem participants.
Currently, the fund continues to receive a portion of the block subsidy. After the NU6.1 update, a scheme based on ZIP 1016 is in effect: 20% of the block reward is directed towards ecosystem development, with 8% going to Zcash Community Grants and another 12% going to the Coinholder-Controlled Fund, created based on the Deferred Dev Fund Lockbox. This model is designed to last until the third Zcash halving in 2028. According to ZecStats, the Lockbox held approximately 63,987 ZEC, valued at around $95 million. Qureshi also opposed a model where fund distribution is entirely determined by direct token holder voting and allowed for the use of temporarily elected councils for certain decisions.
The question of the fund's future has already sparked various proposals within the ecosystem. Paradigm co-founder Matt Huang previously supported maintaining the Dev Fund, noting the importance of continuous funding for infrastructure projects, but also did not support exclusively direct ZEC holder voting. Winklevoss Capital analyst Maxim Desal, on the other hand, proposed abandoning the existing structure. Meanwhile, the network continues to change technical parameters: on September 16, ZEC holders supported reducing block time from 75 to 25 seconds and maintaining the halving schedule. Previously, developers from Electric Coin Company left the company and subsequently created the Zcash Open Development Lab.
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