Cardano's infrastructure depends on open source software maintained by a handful of individuals with no formal support, succession planning, or continuity funding. Research shows 96% of commercial codebases contain OSS with fewer than 10 contributors. Critical protocol libraries, wallet SDKs, developer tooling, and indexing infrastructure have single maintainers, no succession plans, and no stable funding beyond episodic grants.

This program establishes a community-governed, data-driven open source sustainment architecture. Funded through direct treasury withdrawal, operated by an independent entity, and overseen by two advisory councils — an External Open Source Advisory Council and a Technical Community Advisory Council.

Four programs: (1) a Maintenance Fund providing long-term retainer funding for the highest-risk infrastructure, selected by dependency data; (2) a Maintainer Development program building structured mentor–mentee pipelines; (3) a CodeForUs bounty program for targeted delivery work; and (4) an Ecosystem Activation Reserve funding contributor entry programs. Selection follows published dependency centrality data, not relationships. Reporting is public and quarterly. All programs carry explicit sunset criteria. The operator is replaceable by community governance. Total: 12,000,000 ADA over 36 months.