EXANTE launches €1M fund to support critical open-source infrastructure

Global prime broker EXANTE has announced the launch of the Gecko Fund, a €1 million grant programme designed to support open-source software projects that underpin trading systems, financial data infrastructure, and the broader fintech ecosystem.

The initiative will provide direct funding to maintainers of widely used but often underfunded open-source technologies, including APIs, developer tools, core infrastructure libraries, and other projects that support modern financial services. The launch comes amid growing concerns about the sustainability of open-source software, as businesses increasingly rely on such tools while maintainers often operate with limited financial backing. This raises risks around software resilience, cybersecurity, and operational vulnerabilities, especially as AI accelerates the discovery of exploits.

Gecko Fund will focus on established open-source projects that are widely adopted but receive limited funding relative to their importance. Priority areas include Erlang/OTP, Scala, Java and JVM technologies, JavaScript, developer tooling, and core infrastructure software. Applications from other projects relevant to the financial ecosystem will also be considered.

The programme has already awarded its first grant, providing €10,000 to Kryo, an open-source Java serialisation framework widely used in high-performance data processing and trading environments.

"Our goal is not simply to fund software. It is to strengthen the communities and maintainers behind the infrastructure that modern finance depends on every day," said Anatoly Knyazev, founder of Gecko Fund and co-founder of EXANTE. "We believe the industry that benefits from these tools should play a role in sustaining them."

Applications will be reviewed quarterly, with grants ranging from €10,000 to €150,000, depending on a project's adoption, impact, funding needs, and relevance to the financial sector. Individuals, project teams, communities, and organisations are eligible to apply.