–Bitcoin’s computer engineering community is the largest R&D community in the world, possibly number 10,000 of the smartest people in the world.

That bold claim comes from Chris Dixon, venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz’s go-to partner for digital currency investments and widely followed Silicon Valley commentator on technology trends. He spoke to us at length this week.

Mr. Dixon’s claim helps explain why his firm, which last December led a $25 million financing round for bitcoin payment processor Coinbase, is outspokenly bullish on the digital currency. He and founding partner Marc Andreessen, a n Internet veteran, believe the open-source, collaborative nature of the bitcoin project will see it through the challenges lying in its path and lead to a host of as-yet-unimagined new applications that work off the bitcoin platform.