(a) Problem the project solves

Zcash is encrypted electronic cash that protects a user's financial privacy instead of exposing their financial history. Shielded Zcash addresses keep financial information private, while transparent addresses make that information public.

(Source: How is Zcash different than Bitcoin?, Shielded vs transparent Zcash)

(b) Operational priorities

Zcash development and operations are supported by multiple independently funded organizations and by protocol funding streams. Since the NU6 upgrade in November 2024, 80% of the block reward goes to miners, 8% goes to Zcash Community Grants, which the Financial Privacy Foundation receives and administers, and 12% accrues to a lockbox. Since the NU6.1 upgrade activated at block 3,146,400 on November 24, 2025, that lockbox is a Coinholder-Controlled Fund under ZIP 1016, and ZEC holders vote directly on whether to distribute those funds as grants to ecosystem contributors or leave them at rest. This replaced the prior direct funding model, which allocated 20% of block subsidies among Zcash Community Grants, Electric Coin Company, and the Zcash Foundation and which ended in November 2024. Zcash development organizations increasingly rely on funding sources outside the block reward. Electric Coin Company ceased operating as Zcash's development company after its entire staff resigned in January 2026, and the former team formed the Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL), a for-profit company that raised more than $25 million in seed funding in March 2026 from Paradigm, a16z crypto, Winklevoss Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Cypherpunk Technologies, Chapter One, Maelstrom, Balaji Srinivasan, and other investors. Bootstrap, the 501(c)(3) that owns Electric Coin Company, renamed itself Sovright in 2026, staffed an operating team, and now builds Zcash infrastructure under its own name. Development work is now distributed across ZODL, the Zcash Foundation, Shielded Labs, Project Tachyon, Valar Group, and Sovright.

(Source: ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016, NU6.1 Upgrade, The Block on ECC departures, The Block on ZODL raise, The Block on Ironwood)

(c) High-level project overview

Zcash was created in 2016 by taking Bitcoin's open-source code and adding zero-knowledge proofs, among other improvements. Users transact through shielded addresses that keep financial information private or transparent addresses that make it public. Protocol changes move through the open ZIP process, in which anyone can submit a draft ZIP, the community debates it, and changes activate when the network adopts an upgrade without breaking consensus. The NU6.3 "Ironwood" upgrade activated at block 3,428,143 on July 28, 2026, retiring the Orchard shielded pool and replacing it with a new formally verified pool whose supply integrity any node can independently check through a turnstile mechanism.

(Source: How is Zcash different than Bitcoin?, Zcash Protocol Agreements and Major Decisions, The Block on Ironwood)

(d) Primary token functions

ZEC is the native digital currency of the Zcash network and the unit distributed through Zcash's block-reward schedule. ZEC has a fixed 21 million supply. Block rewards fund miners, Zcash Community Grants, and the Coinholder-Controlled Fund under the current allocation rules. ZEC also carries a governance function. Under ZIP 1016, coinholders vote their ZEC to decide whether and how the Coinholder-Controlled Fund is disbursed, and coinholder votes are used in protocol-scope decisions such as the NU7 scope vote beginning August 25, 2026.

(Source: What are the economics of Zcash?, ZIP 1016, NU7 Coinholder Vote)

(e) Control surface reliance

Zcash's control surface relies on community input rather than a unilateral tokenholder governance mechanism, and coinholder voting is now an active part of that model. Anyone can submit a draft ZIP, draft ZIPs are debated by the community, and changes activate when the network adopts an upgrade without breaking consensus. Clear consensus is determined through community polling within and outside the Zcash Community Advisory Panel and through coinholder votes. ZIP 1016 made coinholder voting binding for Coinholder-Controlled Fund disbursements, with a 420,000 ZEC quorum and simple-majority threshold, and Valar Group and Project Tachyon have called a coinholder vote on NU7 scope beginning August 25, 2026 and lasting approximately 18 days. The 2019 trademark agreement that required Electric Coin Company and the Zcash Foundation to jointly approve any network upgrade creating a new consensus protocol has been terminated. Electric Coin Company terminated that agreement, and the Zcash Foundation is now the sole steward of the Zcash trademarks under a permissive trademark policy adopted in February 2025.

(Source: Zcash Protocol Agreements and Major Decisions, ZIP 1016, NU7 Coinholder Vote, New Zcash Trademark Policy, ECC on ending the trademark agreement)

(a) IP ownership & control

Zcash does not have a DAO, and no DAO owns or controls Zcash intellectual property. The Zcash Foundation is the sole steward of the Zcash trademarks, and the core node software is published under permissive open-source licenses.

(Source: New Zcash Trademark Policy, Zebra, Zakura, and the road through NU6.3)

(b) Contract/admin powers

Zcash does not have a DAO legal wrapper or a separate DAO administrative layer. Governance runs through the ZIP process. Anyone can submit a draft ZIP, draft ZIPs are debated by the community, decisions are written into the Zcash specification and the software that runs the network, and changes activate when the network adopts the upgrade without breaking consensus. Clear consensus is determined through polling within and outside the Zcash Community Advisory Panel and through coinholder votes. Under ZIP 1016, disbursements from the Coinholder-Controlled Fund require a coinholder vote with a 420,000 ZEC quorum and a simple majority, and a grant approved by coinholders must be stopped if a Key-Holder Organization declares that funding it would violate its legal or reporting obligations or if two or more Key-Holder Organizations declare a principled objection based on potential harm to Zcash users or the values of the Zcash community.

(Source: Zcash Protocol Agreements and Major Decisions, Zcash Community Advisory Panel, ZIP 1016)

(c) Locked-token rights (conditional)

N/A

(d) Value accrual & holder rights

ZEC holders control the Coinholder-Controlled Fund established by ZIP 1016. Twelve percent of block rewards accrue to that fund, seeded by the Deferred Dev Fund Lockbox, and coinholders vote directly on whether to distribute those funds as grants to ecosystem participants or leave them at rest. Coinholders hold no rights to protocol revenue or treasury assets beyond this fund. The model runs through the third halving in November 2028.

(Source: ZIP 1016, Messari Zcash Overview)

(e) Dissolution authority

No DAO entity exists to dissolve or wind up. The ZIP 1016 funding model is activated through the third halving in November 2028, after which the community will reevaluate whether it should be changed or codified for longer.

(Source: ZIP 1016)

(a) Entity

The Zcash Foundation is a Delaware corporation organized not for profit, does not have authority to issue capital stock, and is described in its certificate of incorporation as a section 501(c)(3) organization.

(Source: ZF Certificate of Incorporation)

(b) IP ownership & control

The Zcash Foundation is the sole steward of the Zcash trademarks. Electric Coin Company donated the trademarks to the Foundation in 2019 and later terminated the accompanying trademark agreement, after which the Foundation adopted a new, more permissive trademark policy in February 2025. The Foundation develops and maintains the Zebra full node, which it releases under permissive open-source licenses. The Foundation has not disclosed any subsidiary entities.

(Source: New Zcash Trademark Policy, Zebra, Zakura, and the road through NU6.3, Zcash Trademark Policy)

(c) Powers over DAO, treasury, protocol-controlled resources, and token administration

The Zcash Foundation does not administer the protocol's grant funding streams. Under ZIP 1015, the Financial Privacy Foundation receives and administers the Zcash Community Grants stream, and under ZIP 1016 disbursements from the Coinholder-Controlled Fund require coinholder approval. The Zcash Foundation's powers consist of its sole stewardship of the Zcash trademarks and its maintenance of the Zebra node software that the network runs following the end of zcashd support in July 2026.

(Source: ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016, New Zcash Trademark Policy, zcashd End of Life)

(d) Powers over DevCo

The Zcash Foundation holds no powers over Electric Coin Company. The mutual-consent requirement of the 2019 trademark agreement, under which both parties had to approve any network upgrade creating a new consensus protocol, ended when Electric Coin Company terminated that agreement, and the Foundation became the sole steward of the trademarks.

(Source: New Zcash Trademark Policy, ECC on ending the trademark agreement)

(e) Contract/admin powers

The Zcash Foundation holds no pause, upgrade, or governance-executor multisig authorities over the protocol. Its trademark policy states that the Foundation may facilitate implementation of protocol changes in Zebra if it is satisfied there is broad community consensus and, where appropriate, a successful security audit.

(Source: Zcash Trademark Policy)

(f) Current economic arrangements and distribution policies

No protocol mechanism currently directs block subsidies to the Zcash Foundation. Direct protocol funding to the Foundation ended in November 2024, when NU6 replaced the prior model that allocated 20% of block subsidies among Zcash Community Grants, Electric Coin Company, and the Zcash Foundation. The Foundation was bootstrapped with individual donations and remains eligible to seek grants through the ZIP 1015 and ZIP 1016 funding streams on the same terms as other ecosystem participants.

(Source: Network Information, ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016, ECC's position on the Zcash dev fund)

(a) Entity

Electric Coin Company, the DevCo directly involved in the issuance of ZEC at launch, is the d/b/a of Zerocoin Electric Coin Company LLC, a Delaware limited liability company headquartered in Denver, Colorado and wholly owned by The Bootstrap Org., Inc., a section 501(c)(3) public charity that now operates under the name Sovright. Electric Coin Company no longer operates as Zcash's development company. Its entire staff, including CEO Josh Swihart, resigned on January 7, 2026 following a governance dispute with the Bootstrap board, and the ECC legal entity has no operating team. Bootstrap itself continued operating. It was renamed to Sovright in 2026 as the same 501(c)(3) entity with the same assets, legal obligations, and board of directors, rebuilt staff under former Bootstrap board members, and now develops and ships Zcash infrastructure under its own name. Live products include the Sovright Mining Pool, the Sovright Relay block propagation network, and Argos, a local-first ZecWallet Lite recovery tool. Michelle Lai serves as executive chairman. The former team founded the Zcash Open Development Lab (ZODL), an independent for-profit company led by Josh Swihart that now performs the core protocol and wallet development work previously done at ECC. ZODL has not publicly disclosed its legal form or jurisdiction of incorporation.

(Source: ECC Transparency Report June 2024, The Block on ECC departures, The Block on ZODL raise, The Block on Sovright and Argos, Sovright Mining Pool Testnet is Live, Sovright)

(b) IP ownership & control

Electric Coin Company holds no rights over the Zcash trademarks. It donated the trademarks to the Zcash Foundation in 2019 and later terminated the accompanying agreement, leaving the Foundation as sole trademark steward. The Zcash protocol software is open source. ZODL houses the Zodl wallet codebase, formerly known as Zashi when developed at ECC, and related intellectual property.

(Source: New Zcash Trademark Policy, ECC on ending the trademark agreement, The Block on ZODL raise)

(c) Powers over DAO, treasury, protocol-controlled resources, and token administration

Electric Coin Company holds no powers over governance, treasury actions, protocol-controlled resources, token administration, or reward parameters. The current funding rules direct 8% of the block subsidy to Zcash Community Grants, administered by the Financial Privacy Foundation, and 12% to the Coinholder-Controlled Fund, whose disbursement requires coinholder approval. Neither ECC nor ZODL holds unilateral authority over these streams.

(Source: ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016)

(d) Powers over Foundation

Electric Coin Company holds no powers over the Zcash Foundation. The shared influence over consensus-protocol changes that existed under the 2019 trademark agreement ended when ECC terminated that agreement.

(Source: New Zcash Trademark Policy, ECC on ending the trademark agreement)

(e) Contract/admin powers

Electric Coin Company holds no pause, upgrade, or governance-executor authorities over the protocol. Security issues are handled through coordinated disclosure processes published on official Zcash security pages, and the July 2026 Ironwood upgrade was coordinated jointly by ZODL, Project Tachyon, Valar Group, the Zcash Foundation, and Shielded Labs rather than by any single company. Sovright maintains its own Zebra fork and mining infrastructure repositories but holds no pause or upgrade authority.

(Source: Security Information, The Block on Ironwood)

(f) Current economic arrangements and distribution policies

No protocol mechanism currently directs block subsidies or protocol-controlled resources to Electric Coin Company, to its parent Sovright, or to ZODL. Sovright funds its work through donations, including a public ZEC donation address, and remains eligible to seek grants through the ZIP 1015 and ZIP 1016 streams on the same terms as other ecosystem participants. A portion of the Founders' Reward funded the first four years of Zcash development, and the 2020 development fund provided continued funding for ECC and the Zcash Foundation through November 2024. ZODL is funded by private venture capital, having raised more than $25 million in seed funding in March 2026 from Paradigm, a16z crypto, Winklevoss Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Cypherpunk Technologies, Chapter One, Maelstrom, and individual investors including Balaji Srinivasan, David Friedberg, and Haseeb Qureshi. ZODL remains eligible to seek grants through the ZIP 1015 and ZIP 1016 funding streams on the same terms as other ecosystem participants.

(Source: ECC's position on the Zcash dev fund, ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016, The Block on ZODL raise)

(a) Launch supply totals

Zero ZEC existed at launch. The first ZEC monetary units came into existence when the blockchain launched on October 28, 2016, and all ZEC has entered circulation through mining issuance. Issuance ramped linearly over the first 5,000 blocks under a mining slow-start before reaching the launch-era block reward of 50 ZEC every ten minutes. (Source: Zcash launch and roadmap, Mining slow start, Funding)

(b) Recipient categories & use of funds

• Recipient Category: Miners
  • Launch / Initial Allocation Detail: 90% of the long-run Zcash monetary base goes to miners, with 80% of newly created ZEC going to miners during the first four years and 100% after that four-year period. (Source: Funding, Continued funding and transparency)
  • Use of Funds / Purpose: Miners are rewarded for maintaining a secure global blockchain that anyone can use. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
  • Initial Vesting / Release Notes: Issuance used a 5,000-block mining slow-start before reaching its maximum value. (Source: Mining slow start)
• Recipient Category: Founders, investors, employees, and advisors
  • Launch / Initial Allocation Detail: 10% of the 21 million ZEC monetary base went to stakeholders in the Zcash Company through the Founders' Reward. (Source: Funding)
  • Use of Funds / Purpose: The Founders' Reward was the stakeholder incentive structure that funded development and aligned long-term support. (Source: Funding, ECC's position on the Zcash dev fund)
  • Initial Vesting / Release Notes: Investors received their share over the first year of mining, and the rest of the founders received their share over the first four years of mining. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
• Recipient Category: Future Zcash Foundation donation commitment
  • Launch / Initial Allocation Detail: Some founders agreed to donate more than 10% of the Founders' Reward, meaning more than 1% of the total monetary base, to a future non-profit Zcash Foundation. (Source: Funding)
  • Use of Funds / Purpose: The commitment bootstrapped a non-profit foundation to serve the interests of Zcash users. (Source: Funding)
  • Initial Vesting / Release Notes: The founders' donation commitment carried no separate published vesting or release schedule beyond the underlying Founders' Reward schedule. (Source: Funding)

(c) Initial price per token (if applicable)

No fixed public TGE price was set. ZEC launched at zero supply and entered circulation through mining, with price discovery occurring on secondary markets. A September 23, 2016 financing disclosure states that the new investor round effectively paid $15.24 per eventual ZEC from its Founders' Reward exposure, and the same disclosure states that this figure is not a simple coin valuation because the investors also received equity in the company. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)

(d) Ticker / market symbol

The ticker is ZEC. (Source: Funding, What are the economics of Zcash?)

(e) Total supply & supply regime

Zcash has a fixed 21 million ZEC monetary base that is mined over time, with the creation rate halving approximately every four years. The second halving occurred in November 2025. As of August 18, 2026, the circulating supply is approximately 16.88 million ZEC, and more than 80% of the maximum supply has been issued. Supply figures should be re-pulled at publication time. (Source: What are the economics of Zcash?, ZIP 1016, CoinGecko Zcash)

(f) Initial vesting / release schedules

Investors received their Founders' Reward share over the first year of mining, the remaining founders received their share over the first four years of mining, and mined issuance ramped through a 5,000-block slow-start before reaching its maximum reward level. The Founders' Reward concluded in November 2020 at the first halving, when the Canopy upgrade activated the 2020 development fund. (Source: Continued funding and transparency, Mining slow start, ECC's position on the Zcash dev fund)

• Planned but not yet executed airdrop: Zcash has never conducted an airdrop and does not plan to execute one. All ZEC has entered circulation through mining issuance and the protocol's funding streams, beginning with the Founders' Reward at launch.

  (Source: Funding, Continued funding and transparency)

• Executed airdrop: Zcash has never conducted an airdrop and does not plan to execute one. All ZEC has entered circulation through mining issuance and the protocol's funding streams, beginning with the Founders' Reward at launch.

  (Source: Funding, Continued funding and transparency)

• No airdrop planned or conducted: Zcash has never conducted an airdrop and does not plan to execute one. All ZEC has entered circulation through mining issuance and the protocol's funding streams, beginning with the Founders' Reward at launch.

  (Source: Funding, Continued funding and transparency)

Blockworks note: No market-maker agreements or deals affecting ZEC liquidity are publicly disclosed. ZEC entered circulation entirely through protocol issuance, and no entity has publicly disclosed loaning or allocating native tokens to market makers.

Blockworks note: No CEX or DEX agreements or deals affecting ZEC liquidity are publicly disclosed. No entity has publicly disclosed token allocations, lockups, or native-token listing fees tied to any exchange listing.

• Series Name: Equity financing round in the Zcash Company. (Source: Funding)
  • Investment Vehicle: Equity
  • Date Of Sale: 2016-02 (Source: Funding)
  • Number of tokens sold: No tokens were sold. Investors acquired equity in the Zcash Company and benefited from the Founders' Reward. (Source: Funding)
  • Vesting Schedule: Founders' Reward exposure vested through the mining schedule over the first four years. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
• Series Name: Equity financing round in the Zcash Company. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
  • Investment Vehicle: Equity
  • Date Of Sale: 2016-09 (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
  • Number of tokens sold: The round carried exposure to an eventual distribution of 131,250 ZEC through the Founders' Reward, alongside equity in the company. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
  • Vesting Schedule: Those investors received their Founders' Reward share over the first year of mining. (Source: Continued funding and transparency)
• Series Name: ZODL seed equity round (no ZEC sold). (Source: The Block on ZODL raise)
  • Investment Vehicle: Equity
  • Date Of Sale: 2026-03 (Source: The Block on ZODL raise)
  • Number of tokens sold: No tokens were sold. ZODL raised more than $25 million in company equity. (Source: The Block on ZODL raise)
  • Vesting Schedule: Not applicable. No token vesting is attached to the equity round. (Source: The Block on ZODL raise)

Blockworks note: Zcash has never conducted a public ICO, SAFT sale, discounted OTC token sale, or discounted market-maker token sale. Pre-launch fundraising took place as equity financing at the Zcash Electric Coin Company, with investors receiving company equity and exposure to the Founders' Reward. Separately, the Zcash Open Development Lab, the successor development company formed in January 2026, raised more than $25 million in a seed equity round in March 2026 from Paradigm, a16z crypto, Winklevoss Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Cypherpunk Technologies, Chapter One, Maelstrom, and individual investors. That ZODL raise involved no sale of ZEC tokens.

(Source: ECC's position on the Zcash dev fund, Funding, Continued funding and transparency, The Block on ZODL raise)

(a) Date & component affected

1. 2019-02-05; pre-Sapling Zcash shielded pool
2. 2026-06-01; Orchard shielded pool zero-knowledge circuit

(b) Exploit vector summary

1. Electric Coin Company disclosed a counterfeiting vulnerability (CVE-2019-7167) that affected Zcash prior to the Sapling network upgrade.
2. Researcher Taylor Hornby of Shielded Labs discovered an under-constrained elliptic-curve multiplication in the Orchard circuit, present since Orchard launched in May 2022, that could theoretically have enabled the creation of counterfeit ZEC inside the shielded pool without public detection.

(c) Quantified impact

1. Electric Coin Company stated there was no evidence of exploitation and no loss of funds.
2. No evidence of exploitation, no impact to user funds, no privacy impact, and no detected change to the total ZEC supply.

(d) Remediation/response taken

1. Electric Coin Company fixed the vulnerability, stated users needed to take no action, and later developed turnstile-enforcement consensus code to preserve the Zcash monetary base in the event of a counterfeiting compromise within shielded supply.
2. An emergency soft fork disabled Orchard activity on June 2, 2026 and a hard fork applied corrected circuit code on June 3, 2026. The NU6.3 "Ironwood" upgrade then activated at block 3,428,143 on July 28, 2026, retiring Orchard and replacing it with a new shielded pool built on the corrected circuit, formally verified with more than 2,700 machine-checked theorems, and gated by a turnstile so that no more ZEC can exit the sealed Orchard pool than legitimately entered it. The remediation was coordinated across ZODL, Project Tachyon, Valar Group, the Zcash Foundation, and Shielded Labs, and zcashd support ended at block 3,417,100 on July 18, 2026 as part of the remediation.

(e) Current status

1. Resolved.
2. Resolved.

(f) References (optional)

1. (Source: Security Announcement 2019-02-05 (CVE-2019-7167), Turnstile Enforcement Against Counterfeiting)
2. (Source: The Block on Ironwood, Ironwood proposal, zcashd End of Life, ZecHub Shielded News Vol. 22)

(a) Regulatory, Legal & Tax Risks

Regulatory treatment has been a live issue for Zcash entities. On January 14, 2026, the Zcash Foundation disclosed that it had received an SEC subpoena on August 31, 2023, and that the SEC concluded its review without intending to recommend enforcement action or other changes against the Foundation. The Foundation's dev-fund guidance also states that embedding a for-profit corporation into compulsory protocol funding could existentially jeopardize Zcash in jurisdictions with strict limitations on securities issuance and trading, and the current ZIP 1015 and ZIP 1016 funding model reflects that concern by routing block subsidies to a community grants program and a coinholder-controlled fund rather than directly to companies.

(Source: Notice Concluding SEC Investigation, Zcash Foundation Guidance on Dev Fund Proposals, ZIP 1015, ZIP 1016)

Tokenholders face ordinary digital-asset tax uncertainty. The IRS states that digital assets are property rather than currency, that income from digital assets is taxable, and that taxpayers must maintain sufficient records to support positions taken on federal income tax returns. Holders are responsible for understanding and reporting their own tax obligations.

(Source: Digital assets)

The Zcash protocol does not restrict access for any jurisdiction or user type. Availability of ZEC trading on specific venues is determined by each venue's own regulatory posture toward privacy-preserving assets rather than by the protocol.

(Source: Network Information)

(b) Protocol, Technology & Security Risks

Zcash has faced real protocol-security risk twice in its history. Electric Coin Company disclosed a pre-Sapling counterfeiting vulnerability in 2019, and in June 2026 researchers disclosed a soundness flaw in the Orchard shielded pool's zero-knowledge circuit that had existed since May 2022 and could theoretically have enabled undetectable counterfeiting of ZEC. Both incidents show that cryptographic implementation errors in shielded pools are the primary technical risk to the protocol, because the private nature of shielded transactions can make exploitation difficult to detect or rule out.

(Source: Security Announcement 2019-02-05 (CVE-2019-7167), The Block on Ironwood)

The ecosystem's response to the 2026 incident materially raised its security posture without eliminating risk. The Ironwood pool that replaced Orchard was built with a machine-checked formal proof of more than 2,700 theorems written in Lean, verifying that Ironwood cannot create undetectable counterfeit ZEC under its stated design assumptions, alongside conventional audits and AI-assisted review. The turnstile mechanism gives any node operator the ability to independently verify supply integrity, and the retirement of the legacy zcashd C++ codebase in July 2026 removed a maintenance liability that maintainers cited as a remediation requirement. These measures reduce but do not eliminate implementation, consensus, and supply-integrity risk, and formal verification covers only the properties and assumptions stated in the proof.

(Source: Cryptonomist on the Ironwood formal proof, zcashd End of Life, Ironwood proposal)

(c) Token Economics, Unlocks & Incentive Risks

Zcash token economics depend on continued mining incentives and on the ecosystem's ability to fund long-term development. ZEC has a fixed 21 million supply, block rewards halve approximately every four years, and the current split directs 80% of the block reward to miners, 8% to Zcash Community Grants, and 12% to the Coinholder-Controlled Fund. Declining block subsidies after each halving increase the network's long-run reliance on transaction fees and external funding for security and development. The January 2026 collapse of Electric Coin Company demonstrated that institutional funding and governance arrangements are a material risk factor, and the ecosystem's answer has been to distribute development across six independently funded organizations, including Sovright, the renamed Bootstrap entity and to fund the largest of them, ZODL, with private venture capital rather than protocol issuance.

(Source: What are the economics of Zcash?, ZIP 1015, The Block on ECC departures, The Block on ZODL raise)

Governance can materially change reward allocation and development-funding structure. ZIP 1016 fixes the current 80/8/12 allocation through the third halving in November 2028, after which the community will reevaluate the model. Within that period, coinholder votes with a 420,000 ZEC quorum and simple majority decide whether Coinholder-Controlled Fund assets are disbursed as grants or left at rest, and coinholder votes also shape protocol scope, including the NU7 scope vote beginning August 25, 2026. Future governance outcomes over funding streams, lockbox disbursement, and network-upgrade scope can change how issuance supports ecosystem participants and how the protocol evolves.

(Source: ZIP 1016, NU7 Coinholder Vote, Messari Zcash Overview)