I have personally worked with the Llama team and I think a deeper collaboration with the Aave DAO could make sense, but not in these terms.
I can’t support a proposal of this type with that budget, due to the following:
- Llama is an entity collaborating with other DAOs, so the collaboration is not exclusive.
- For what I am aware, the team is relatively small, and the list of tasks is really extensive. Even one of its co-founders is already working close to full capacity as the lead of the Aave Grants DAO. It is difficult to say how realistic is the scope.
- It is true that Llama has contributed in the past to the Aave community on different proposals (and properly rewarded with grants from the Aave Grants DAO), but I can’t say that the order of technical magnitude of those proposals is precedent enough to consider this quite sizeable budget.
- Different from the other parties mentioned by the OP, generally with deep history and knowledge of the Aave ecosystem (initial creators/developers of the protocol, security firms collaborating with Aave since almost Aave v1, etc), Llama’s specific background with Aave is not enough in my opinion to present this kind of scope and budget.
- Regarding the scope:
- Management and optimization of the holdings of the protocol itself are valuable, but I’m against a systematic approach to this, as security and stability on a protocol like Aave is the highest priority at the current moment. Any continuous engagement in that direction will create really difficult situations for the community to choose between “profit” and risk. Given that, I have no problem with entities like Llama proposing ad-hoc strategies, but I’m fully against having an entity whose role is to optimize these holdings; not at the current moment.
- Data analytics and financial reports are useful and valuable for the community, that is one of the reasons the Aave Grants DAO has been awarding a lot of funds in that direction. I see value in the items proposed in this direction, but in general, it is a compilation of resources already rewarded out there, and consolidated in 1 place for better visibility of the protocol’s accounting.
- GHO is approved by the community, but 1) the code is not public 2) is not operative yet 3) it is not possible to predict how its market will look. It is just nonsense to include in scope (and charge for it) the growth and let’s say optimization of a system that is not even yet released.
- I have communicated this personally previously to the OP on previous proposals, but the the Aave DAO must not compensate a full flow of assets’ listing, only the creation of mechanisms to support teams working on listings. First, if teams have an interest in listing a new asset on Aave, this is a decentralized system, so there are some extra procedures to be done; second, there are already entities (e.g. BGD on the technical side, Gauntlet on the risk side) well funded at the moment improving everything around listings, and helping teams with the technicalities around it. That being said, Llama role in some listings in the past was of a middle-party between Aave and the teams pursuing listings, a really diligent party I can say, but the Aave DAO should not pay for this, as it is already paying on something that heavily overlaps.
- I think strategic partnerships and meta governance are valuable items, and fitting Llama.
- On risk-related aspects, I think Llama can provide additional value and be rewarded for it.
- Data around the Safety Module is also an interesting item in the scope.
In summary, on the current shape, I can’t support the proposal. Only with a reduced scope and budget makes sense in my opinion. I think way fewer items on the scope and a budget in the $1-1.5 million range make more sense for an initial collaboration and to grow the expertise of Llama itself on Aave.
P.S. It is important to highlight again that my collaboration with members of Llama has been always exceptional, they take really seriously the way they contribute to Aave. So my disagreement is exclusive to the terms of the proposal (scope & budget), not in any shape or form with Llama onboarding with Aave.