Vyper - Grant Completion Report

DAO Programs & Initiatives Domain Allocator Offerings (prev Questbook)
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Vyper - Grant Completion Report

1. Executive Summary

Project: Vyper

Questbook Application: https://questbook.app/dashboard/?grantId=67d802bd46da2f90cc3267b0&chainId=10&role=builder&proposalId=67fdae19255be812400387d8

Website & Socials:

Vyper is a pythonic smart contract programming language for the Ethereum Virtual Machine, currently securing over $100m TVL on Arbitrum and $4+ billion across multiple chains. Through this Arbitrum grant, we successfully delivered two major releases (v0.4.2 and v0.4.3) that introduced critical new features including proxy contract support, enhanced reentrancy protection, and significant performance optimizations.

The $50,000 grant directly funded developer salaries for four core contributors and security audits, enabling us to maintain our development velocity while ensuring the highest security standards. These funds were instrumental in delivering features that make Vyper contracts more secure, efficient, and accessible to developers building on Arbitrum.

2. Performance Against KPIs

Note: As stated in our application, formal KPIs were not applicable for most milestones except for optimization metrics where we successfully achieved our performance targets. We nonetheless provide some other meaningful numbers to gauge the success of the release

Metric Result
Release Downloads v0.4.2: 6,360 downloads
v0.4.3: 7,127 downloads
Contract Size Optimization 5% average reduction achieved
Security Issues Resolved 2 low severity GHSAs patched
Compilation Performance CSE elimination & dead-store elimination implemented

3. Qualitative Impact & Community Feedback

Most Significant Non-Quantitative Outcomes:

  • Enhanced Security by Default: Implementation of file-level reentrancy protection fundamentally improves the security of all new Vyper contracts

  • Proxy Contract Capabilities: Vyper can now create fully functional proxy contracts, closing a critical feature gap with Solidity

  • Pure Vyper Standard Library: Migration to pure Vyper implementations makes the codebase more auditable and reduces compiler complexity

User Testimonials:

Alberto - Curve Finance:

“Our new ownership-proxy wouldn’t have been possible without Vyper promptly shipping key compiler features for us. With this upgrade, delegating Llamalend market parameters will give curators powerful new tools—and we’re excited to bring it live soon on Arbitrum.”

pcaversaccio - Co-Founder and Lead at SEAL 911:

“Reentrancy is an EVM-level feature but, in most cases, a language-level bug (with very few exceptions). Enabling reentrancy protection at the file level is a security-first approach, allowing developers to apply contract-wide mutex locks with minimal friction and a better devex.”

Social Media Impact:

4. Financial Summary

The funds were utilized exactly as outlined in our original proposal. Vyper’s annual budget consists primarily of payroll expenses and audit costs, and this grant provided critical support for both areas. The funds were used to pay salaries for 4 core contributors and to cover some of the costs of audits with our partners ChainSecurity and Anatomist.

5. Future Plans & Continued Ecosystem Alignment

Upcoming Development Roadmap:

  • Language Features: Abstract methods, native asset types, enhanced string manipulation capabilities

  • Compiler Optimizations: Continued work on the Venom backend for even better performance

  • Formal Verification: Advancing our collaboration with Verifereum toward a fully verified compiler

Increased Adoption and Arbitrum Ecosystem Engagement:

We plan to continue our efforts to push for Vyper adoption among new and existing crypto protocols while remaining deeply committed to the Arbitrum ecosystem.

  • Protocol Adoption: The 2nd half of 2025 has seen a number of new protocols built in Vyper such as Yield Basis, Ripe Finance, RAAC and Open Stablecoin Index

  • Institutional Outreach: We have been working to connect with financial institutions with an interest in blockchain to showcase Vyper’s advantages and would be interested in joining forces in these efforts with people working on Arbitrum business development.

  • Existing Partner Expansion: We want to continue to encourage current Vyper-based protocols to expand their Arbitrum presence

Impact on Future Funding:

This grant’s successful completion strengthens our position for future funding opportunities. As Vyper is a recipient of an Ethereum Foundation Grant with a matching component, Arbitrum’s contribution as also been matched 100% by the Ethereum Foundation. We continue to work tirelessly with our existing partners and to seek new funders to continue to support Vyper’s continued development.

6. Additional Remarks

We are deeply honored and grateful to have received support from the Arbitrum DAO.
The successful delivery of all milestones within the projected timeline demonstrates our team’s commitment to excellence and responsible stewardship of community resources. As Vyper continues to grow as a secure-by-default language for smart contract development, we look forward to deepening our partnership with the Arbitrum ecosystem and contributing to its continued success. We believe that a robust, multi-language ecosystem makes Arbitrum more resilient, accessible, and secure for all developers and users.

We once again extend our thanks to the Arbitrum DAO and the people behind the grant program (hi Juandi :waving_hand: )who have helped us draft our proposal and guided us through the application and completion process.