Pioneer is open to anyone working on any type of project.

We’re looking for ambitious, creative people working on something interesting. It can be research, software, a work of art, a company — anything!

Our goal is to be as international as possible. We may be technically unable to support certain countries (like North Korea), but we’re trying our best to appeal to everyone.

Apart from any legal restrictions, there is no age limit for Pioneer. We think we can help young people the most, but we'll gladly fund anyone at any age.

Pioneers will receive...

• $1,000 to spend however you’d like. You can buy a computer, books, coffee or whatever your heart desires. We trust that you’ll use the money to advance yourself somehow.
• $6,000 in Stellar lumens.
• $100,000 in Google Cloud credits.
• A round-trip ticket to Silicon Valley for a week-long retreat with other Pioneers.
• Mentorship from some of the world’s most successful individuals.
• Access to the private online Pioneer community.
• A 1-year subscription to The Economist.
• Participation in Pioneer’s Presentation Day.

Pioneer is designed to help determined and ambitious people take their project to the next level. We’re providing a network, guidance and funding. You should apply if you think you think those things would benefit you.

Applications must be submitted by Monday April 8 at 6:59am UTC.

After you submit your initial application, you’ll go through a 4-week process called the Pioneer Tournament. You’ll demonstrate weekly progress, vote on other applicants, and see where you stand on the Pioneer Leaderboard. You can learn more about the Pioneer Tournament here.

Our intention is to run as many as possible. If you don’t get selected in the current tournament, you can always re-apply next month.

Yes! We expect many Pioneers to be students or employed full-time. You just need to make sure you don’t have any legal conflicts (for example, an IP contract you’ve signed with your employer).

Yes. You can add your teammates when filling out your application. Please don’t submit multiple applications per team. Teams will receive $1,000 total, not per teammate.

No. You’re only allowed to apply once per batch, whether that’s as the main applicant or as a teammate on someone else’s application. You can always re-apply in a future batch.

The final step in the tournament has our experts providing a final review on the top applications, based on leaderboard rankings. After their votes have been applied to the leaderboard, we select the top-scoring applicants as Pioneers. We're experimenting with the number of winners per-batch, so cohorts will vary in size. We also encourage everyone, even winners, to reapply.

Houses let you invite a few friends you think are promising to your scene and play the Pioneer Tournament, together. House scores will be based on the point average of the group. At the end of the tournament, players in the best-performing House will each get $1,000 (in addition to anything else they might win individually).

You are free to do whatever you like with the grant. Buy books, coffee or a laptop.

If you create a company from your project and decide to raise money from investors, Pioneer will have the right to invest up to $100,000 alongside them. You are under no obligation to start a company. We expect many of our best Pioneers to be researchers, painters and musicians. We’re hoping the fraction of entrepreneurs helps us fund the rest. More on our offer page.

The same conditions as above apply, starting with your next financing round.

There are many fantastic programs that try and help small business get big. Pioneer is focused on finding and supporting great people, not companies. You can apply with any type of project, even if it isn't a company.

Your score will change as applicants and experts review your application throughout the Pioneer Tournament. The best way to reach & maintain a high score is to demonstrate impressive progress every week.

We originally thought the value of Pioneer was primarily a cash grant. Turns out we were wrong. Our users surprised us. The thing people love most is the sense of accountability, motivation and community. As such, we’d like to have a much larger number of people participate in the Pioneer Tournament, and a larger number of people win it. We’d even like winners to re-apply.

Playing Pioneer shouldn’t be a one-off thing. It’s a thing you do to maintain healthy levels of productivity. A gym for progress. We’re reducing our cash grant size to accommodate for the higher-volume model, while adding in other prizes and benefits to winning Pioneer, like a round-trip ticket to Silicon Valley, $6,000 in Stellar lumens, the potential for a $100,000 follow-on investment and more.