Aave completed an extensive R&D and security milestone for its Aave V4 protocol upgrade, which included roughly 345 days of cumulative security review via audits, formal verification, invariant testing, fuzzing, and a public security contest funded by a $1.5 million DAO-approved security budget. Aave achieved a major R&D milestone with the completion of its redesigned Aave V4 architecture, introducing liquidity hubs and spokes, collateral-level risk pricing, and a new share-based accounting model, following nearly a year of audits and testing. Aave's monthly active user base on its DeFi lending protocol nearly doubled over the past six months, reaching about 155,000 in February, marking an all-time high. Aave Labs proposed a new funding framework asking the Aave DAO for $25 million in stablecoins plus 75,000 AAVE over two years, along with additional conditional product grants, in exchange for directing 100% of Aave-branded product revenue to the DAO and moving IP to a new Aave Foundation. A governance proposal titled 'Aave Will Win' asked Aave DAO tokenholders to approve up to $42.5 million in stablecoins plus 75,000 AAVE tokens as an operating funding package for Aave Labs under a DAO-funded model.