Hi there, I’m part of the Velodrome team and I’d like to provide some context from a developer perspective.
Spearbit always went an extra mile for helping us get the best setup (6 researchers, two rounds of audit, overall probably a month of work across both teams). We came to them with very specific requests and they just made it happen.
By supporting this initiative, Optimism protocols basically get a priority and an opportunity to receive the best possible security review from a top tier researchers community (there’s just a handful of good researhers, and it would be great to see these folks focused on our network of protocols and users)! I believe this will help projects launch with confidence on OP mainnet and, by extent make Optimism a stronger and committed brand in front of the end-users.
There will be exceptions of the protocols who can buy any audit service they want, but there should be an alternative for those who chose to bootstrap or are looking for a chain where the priorities are aligned across all levels (operations, products, safety) and participants (network, protocols, users).