San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase has revealed two separate contributions to the Bitcoin ecosystem today. Here’s how the top crypto platform plans to boost the future of the first-ever cryptocurrency and make it more accessible, flexible, and DeFi-ready.

Coinbase and its CEO Brian Armstrong has in the past been criticized for bypassing Bitcoin to instead promote altcoins.

But the cryptocurrency exchange today announced it is offering two grants from its Crypto Community Fund to developers that work on the Bitcoin core code or “closely associated” projects.

Related Reading | Why A Stock Market Listing For Coinbase Is Ultimately Ironic For Crypto

A blog post from Coinbase EVP of Engineering Manish Gupta explains that Bitcoin was born without fundraising, yet “bootstrapped” an entire industry.

Coinbase is beginning our search for at least two Bitcoin development grant recipients starting today. If you'd like to apply or nominate a Bitcoin core developer to be sponsored, read more here and fill out the form. https://t.co/2oGhfA9v6z

— Coinbase (@coinbase) October 15, 2020

Rather than other projects that have active founders, a team of developers, and even a marketing team, Bitcoin thrives on the open-source community alone.

“The open source community has provided critical support for Bitcoin development, with some support from donations from industry organizations and academic institutions. Our goal is to similarly support developers who are committed to growing and maintaining the Bitcoin ecosystem,” Gupta said.

Two developers will receive grants of a currently unrevealed sum, by filling out an application. Crypto users that know someone active in the Bitcoin community, are urged to share the news.

Coinbase Pro,(formerly GDAX) the professional trading platform owned by Coinbase, also announced it kickstarting deposits on October 19, to begin allowing trading of Wrapped Bitcoin (WBTC) starting October 20.

Bitcoin is used as a payment currency, store of wealth, and speculative asset for trading, but by wrapping it in Ethereum and tokenizing BTC in a smart contract, the original cryptocurrency is lent a world of new abilities.

Wrapped BTC can trade on decentralized exchanges or be used for lending and borrowing, as well as other DeFi applications.

The supply of WBTC is growing, not only benefitting Ethereum but Bitcoin as well. The more BTC wrapped in Ethereum and locked away in DeFi applications, the less likely that BTC will be sold into the market, which is bullish for the overall crypto market.

Related Reading | Ethereum Wrapped Bitcoin Supply Doubles In August Alone, But Why?

This tokenized BTC brings flexibility to the first-ever cryptocurrency that it couldn’t otherwise have without a warm hug from the top-ranked altcoin, Ethereum.

https://t.co/OgGckNC5nq

— Coinbase Pro (@CoinbasePro) October 15, 2020

With its arms wrapped around big brother BTC, the two assets play nicer together than when apart. And with Coinbase now embracing tokenized BTC, the Bitcoin, Ethereum, and DeFi ecosystem will grow better together.

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