After austerity, the Ethereum Foundation relaunches developer recruitment

The Ethereum Foundation has ended a period of austerity and relaunched its Ethereum Protocol Fellowship (EPF7) in 2026 to recruit developers and accelerate protocol innovation. With 18 grants awarded in Q1 2026 and mentoring plus monthly stipends for fellows, the program targets improvements in security, zero-knowledge proofs and Layer-2 scalability—areas that could materially boost Ethereum adoption and transaction economics. The initiative is framed as a strategic move to bolster ETH’s position versus Bitcoin, with analysts suggesting a possible “flippening” by 2028–2030 if adoption and scalability improve. Market impact: renewed developer funding could support ETH’s fundamentals and adoption narrative, reinforcing a bullish case for ETH over the medium term.