## Inspiration
Open-source software powers nearly every modern application, yet the maintainers behind critical infrastructure often receive little or no financial support. High-profile incidents like Log4Shell, Heartbleed, and the xz-utils backdoor exposed the risks of underfunded projects. While many enterprises want to give back, funding open source is still handled through emails, spreadsheets, procurement tickets, and manual approvals.
We built GitSplits to make sponsoring open source as structured, compliant, and auditable as paying any other vendor—using AI agents to automate the operational work while keeping humans in control of high-impact decisions.
## What it does
GitSplits transforms an open-source funding request into an end-to-end enterprise workflow.
A sponsor submits a request, and UiPath Maestro orchestrates every step: AI analyzes repository health and contributor impact, contributors are verified, compliance and sanctions checks are performed, approvals are routed based on risk, funding splits are created on-chain, payouts are executed, and the entire process concludes with a TEE-attested audit trail.
Low-risk grants can complete autonomously in minutes, while larger or higher-risk requests automatically involve finance, compliance, and executive stakeholders.
## How we built it
GitSplits combines UiPath's automation platform with modern AI and Web3 infrastructure.
- **UiPath Maestro** orchestrates the entire funding case from intake to reconciliation.
- **UiPath Agent Builder** powers autonomous intake triage and approval routing.
- A **LangChain** agent performs multi-step repository analysis and contributor scoring.
- A custom **Node.js controller** exposes typed REST APIs for GitHub, NEAR, EigenAI, Ping Pay, and HOT Pay.
- A **NEAR smart contract** stores funding splits and contributor verification.
- **Action Center** inserts human approvals only when necessary.
- **EigenAI** and **Phala dstack** provide trusted execution and signed attestations for every completed funding case.
The project was scaffolded using Claude Code through the UiPath Coding Agents workflow, accelerating development of our APIs, LangChain agent, and Maestro configuration.
## Challenges we ran into
The biggest challenge wasn't AI—it was enterprise orchestration.
Designing workflows that balanced autonomy with governance required careful thinking. We needed dynamic approval routing instead of static approval matrices, reliable exception handling for payout failures and contributor disputes, and a clean interface between UiPath-native agents and external AI services.
Another challenge was making diverse technologies—UiPath, LangChain, NEAR, EigenAI, and payment providers—feel like a single cohesive platform rather than disconnected components.
## Accomplishments that we're proud of
- Built a complete end-to-end enterprise funding workflow rather than just an AI demo.
- Successfully integrated UiPath Maestro, Agent Builder, Action Center, and API Workflows into a single orchestration layer.
- Created a hybrid architecture where UiPath-native agents and external LangChain agents collaborate seamlessly.
- Produced auditable, TEE-attested funding decisions suitable for enterprise compliance.
- Designed an approval model that allows low-risk funding requests to complete autonomously while escalating higher-risk cases appropriately.
- Delivered production-style documentation, OpenAPI specifications, and reusable workflows that others can reproduce.
## What we learned
Building enterprise AI systems is less about making better models and more about orchestrating reliable business processes.
We learned that human oversight remains essential for financial decisions, while AI delivers the greatest value by eliminating repetitive operational work. We also gained experience integrating confidential computing, blockchain infrastructure, and enterprise automation into a unified workflow with clear accountability and auditability.
## What's next for GitSplits
Our next goal is to evolve GitSplits into a production-ready enterprise platform.
We plan to launch a self-service sponsor portal, integrate with enterprise CMDBs and dependency graphs for richer repository criticality analysis, support pooled funding from multiple organizations, expand payment rails globally, and provide contributors with a transparency portal containing payout history and cryptographically verifiable attestations.
Long term, we envision GitSplits becoming the standard enterprise workflow for sustainable open-source funding—making it as easy for companies to fund maintainers as it is to pay any other strategic vendor.
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