Crowdfunding PR Offers Startups New Service to Build Investor Databases for Title III and Title IV Reg. A+ Mini IPO Crowdfunding Campaigns to Target Precise Lists of Angel, Venture Capital and Private Equity Investors

Investor relations teams can now search through over 175,000 angel, equity and venture capital investors, analyze 575,000 of their prior investments and then target a very precise list of potential investors

By Robert Hoskins

Crowdfunding PR Shows Startups How to Build Investor Databases for Title III and Title IV, Reg. A+ Crowdfunding Campaigns to Target Precise Lists of Angel, Private Equity and VC Investors

New York City, New York – Crowdfunding PR’s new investor marketing database service allows equity crowdfunding campaign managers to drill down inside private equity and venture capital firms to find highly-qualified principals, partners, portfolio managers and family offices with the highest propensity to invest in their type of product/service and do sorts by vertical business segments, by geographical locations and by types of deals such as seed capital, private equity, series A/B, late-stage funding rounds and many, many other searchable financial database sorting characteristics, variables and demographics.

“The greatest challenge for startups, entrepreneurs and growing small businesses is finding potential angel investors, private equity investors and/or building out their own private investment syndicate of investors with a high propensity to invest in similar types deals as the one they want to pitch to investors,” said Robert Hoskins, Crowdfunding PR’s Director of Investor Relations. “The same need is present for the hundreds of new equity crowdfunding platforms that have launched new equity crowdfunding platforms in the past twelve months. Crowdfunding PR can utilize the investor database to market any deal on any equity crowdfunding platform to a very wide, but yet very precise and carefully selected list of angel, private equity and VC investors.”

The new investor database provides private investment information on the end-to-end fundraising process. From initial exits to fund returns, it offers the best information available for the complete lifecycle of private investing. This includes Limited Partner (LP) commitments, fundraising, remaining dry powder in funds, deals, company evaluations and fund performance as well as the service providers, executives, and lead partners behind the deals.

The private investor database provides clients with access to stats to build pitch books, contacts to setup road tours, run private and public comps, source co-investors, model cash flows, conduct competitive analysis, follow the entire venture capital (VC) marketplace, build and expand investor networks, target deal makers and identify private equity (PE) and VC firms actively doing deals. The quality of work that can be turned around on a compressed timeline is nothing short of amazing and will be 10 times more efficient and 3 times to 5 times more accurate than other types of private investment information that can be found online via Google and LinkedIn.

If your startup or existing business needs help building and an investor database, creating an effective pitch deck, building a direct email marketing program and/or scheduling an investor “dog and pony” roadshow, please call Robert Hoskins at (512) 627-6622 or contact him via @Crowdfunding_PR on Twitter.

Crowdfunding PR’s
Investor Marketing Database

Access a Huge Database of Potential Investors

• Angels
• VCs
• Portfolio Managers
• Lead Partners
• Deal Details
• Partners

Drill Down to Develop Precise Investor Targets

• Deal experience
• Board seats
• Biography
• Education
• LinkedIn profiles
• LinkedIn connections
• Phone and email contact information

Analyze Investor’s Past/Current Deals

• Angel & seed
• Venture
• Buyouts
• Secondary transactions
• Mergers & acquisitions
• Debt financings
• Initial Public Offerings (IPOs)
• Valuations, terms & multiples
• Cap tables
• Participants
• Deal history
• Exits & IPOs

Perform Competitive Analysis of Funded Companies/Deal Structures

• Startup and angel-backed companies
• Venture capital-backed companies
• Private equity-backed companies
• Mature private companies
• Public companies
• Strategic acquirers
• Key private company financials
• Full public company fundamentals

Gather In-depth Competitor News & Big Data Analytics

• News stories
• Quarterly reports
• Data visualization
• Custom analytics

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Robert Hoskins
(512) 627-6622
@Crowdfunding_PR

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Mr. Robert Hoskins is a seasoned marketing veteran with a proven track record of helping entrepreneurs, startups, small businesses as well as Fortune 500 corporations launch successful marketing communications campaigns to gain market traction for a wide variety of products and services.

On a regular basis, Mr. Hoskins consults on a regular basis with crowdfunding campaign managers as well as crowdfunding sites, portals and platforms to deliver successful crowdfunding marketing campaigns.

Google search “Robert Hoskins Crowdfunding” to see why Mr. Hoskins is considered one of the industry’s foremost crowdfunding experts that has amassed a huge social media following, which is dedicated to supporting donation-, rewards- and equity-based crowdfunding campaigns.

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VerteCore Lift™ Offers Chiropractors a Peer-Reviewed Spine Decompression Medical Device They Can Prescribe to Treat Herniated Discs, Degenerative Disc Disease, Scoliosis, Sciatica and Back Pain

 Get in Line Now if You
Want the Early Bird Special

Read the three customer testimonials from doctors that detail their own personal battle with chronic back pain and how the affordable, easy-to use “Lift™” made a big difference in returning to a normal life

By Robert Hoskins

 

Los Angeles, California – VerteCore Technologies announced a new program for Chiropractors that will allow them to lease affordable, mobile spinal decompression units that will augment scheduled chiropractic adjustment procedures. The VerteCore Lift™ can be used in a clinical setting that allows Chiropractors to offer spinal decompression in a very compact office setting that was not previously available with the large spinal decompression tables that cost $125,000 or more to install and required a very large footprint.

VerteCore Lift – Affordable, Mobile Spinal Decompression for Active Adults

The clinical version of the Lift sells for only $1,199, which makes it the most affordable spinal decompression medical technology product on the orthopedic marketplace, and multiple units can be stored in a single small cabinet.

Chiropractors can prescribe the VerteCore Lift as in-office treatment or offer it as an at-home-use solution that back pain patients can wear 20-to-30 minutes per visit/day to allow the spine to be stretched out, which allows blood, nutrients and the body’s natural healing processes to flow through the spine uninhibited to help the body repair itself by rehydrating and resorption of the herniated discs, which relieves the pressure on pinched nerves that cause most types of back-pain-related disorders.

During the VerteCore Lift’s med-tech’s product development process a number of medical doctors and pain management specialists have peer-reviewed the compact spinal decompression device and provided not only positive customer testimonials, but have made personal investments in the company in order to introduce the VerteCore “Lift” to the $57 billion Orthopedic medical device marketplace.

VerteCore Lift, Affordable, Comfortable, Mobile Spinal Decompression

The following medical professionals have had a variety of back pain related medical problems and recently had a chance to personally try on and evaluate the VerteCore Lift. All were skeptical about trying out another new promising back pain relief medical device based on their trials and tribulations with other devices such as inversion tables that did not work, gave them headaches from too much blood rushing to their head and ended up causing more pain in their ankles and knees than the relief it provided for their back pain.

But after years of spending thousands of dollars on doctor visits, MRI’s, long-term physical therapy sessions, cortisone shots, pain medications, and back surgeries, all of these medical professionals were just like a wide cross-section of the American population that were willing to try anything to get rid of their chronic back pain. And when they did they were surprised at how well the “Lift” performed.

Dr. Mark J. Mulvihill, Ph.D., Vice-Pres., X-Rx, Cambridge, MA

“I woke up on Christmas Day six years ago and my leg hurt extremely bad and I thought maybe I had pulled a hamstring. After several doctor visits and an MRI exam I was diagnosed with Sciatica, which was being caused by a herniated L5 S1 disc.

For five years I went through extensive physical therapy, cortisone shots, and many types of pain medications, which caused problems with my digestive tract and gave me pretty bad heartburn.

I have tried many back pain devices that are advertised on TV, but the only one that gave me any type of relief was an inversion table where you hang upside down and let gravity stretch the spine with the body’s weight. While it gave me temporary back pain relief, I am tall and weigh around 200 pounds. Putting that much pressure on my knees and ankles hurt and negated the effects of my back pain relief. It also gave me headaches because of the blood that rushed to my head while hanging upside down.

Before all of this started I was a competitive golfer and the back pain basically forced me into early retirement. I longed to play the game, but I simply could not because I could not rotate my back at all without excessive pain.

By nature and due to my medical education I am very skeptical when it comes to trying out new back pain devices, but a friend of a friend introduced me to Paul Leake. We agreed to meet during a business trip, which was actually good because travel usually is an excruciatingly painful experience for people with back pain.

Paul Leake, Managing Director, VerteCore Technologies

We met and after wearing the VerteCore Lift for 20 minutes my back pain was completely gone. For the first time in years, I could actually sit up easily from a laying down position. It was incredible. I felt so good the next day that instead of sitting on the sidelines as usual, I spent a full day sliding around slippery slides at the local water park with my family. It was an awesome feeling.

A good friend of mine, Dr. David Curtis, also suffers from back pain associated with degenerative disc disease, which left him with six herniated discs. One day we played 36 holes of golf and both of our backs were sore so I mentioned that I had the VerteCore Lift with me. We took turns wearing the Lift for 20 minutes each and the pain relief was immediate.

It worked so well that David wanted to purchase a Lift and was disappointed that my device was a demo unit and that they would not be available until an upcoming Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign that will be launched sometime in April 2016.

If you have any type of back pain caused by herniated discs and pinched nerves, I highly recommend that you try a VerteCore Lift. It is simple, cost-effective and very easy to put on and wear during a 20-minute doctor visit or buying your own Lift so that you can wear it during your normal daily routine.

 

Dr. David Curtis, Ph.D., Psychologist, based in Long Island, New York

“My story is similar to Mark’s. I was diagnosed two years ago with degenerative disc disease and by the time I had my first MRI, the exam showed that I had six herniated discs.

Like Mark, my back pain made it tough to play golf. So when he called and asked me if I wanted to play a round of golf I wanted to say no, but he said that he had a new med-tech device that would decompress the spine and help reduce my back pain. When I tried it on, much to my surprise it did and I felt the decompression effects for the whole day. And I only wore it for 20 minutes.

What surprised me is how simple the device was to operate and how much better I felt. I would highly recommend a ‘Lift’ to anyone with back pain. Simple back pain relief is a good thing for everyone.”

Dr. Richard F. Mestayer, Medical Doctor/Psychiatrist, Springfield, Louisiana

“The VerteCore Lift was introduced to me through a good friend, Stanley Cooper. He told me some very positive things about the med-tech spine decompression device and I became very interested in the product due to my own person experience with chronic back pain.

Unfortunately for me, I have had back surgery twice with the final one being a “Fusion.” So instead, I had several patients try it on at my office and it was very clear from their facial expressions that it was doing a good job at melting away their pain.

As an MD, I think that the VerteCore Lift would have been very helpful to me during the years prior to my surgery. The VerteCore Lift is not designed to help patients with fusions, but I wish that it had been available when I began having my back pain. I feel confident that if I had healed better from my earlier minor back injuries that I probably could have completely avoided undergoing back surgery altogether.

I would definitely recommend that all future patients try a VerteCore Lift before contemplating irreversible back surgery. You will be glad you did.”

If you would like to pre-order single units or purchase volume quantities before the Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign begins, please fill out the contact form at http://vertecore.com or call Paul Leake direct at (601) 807-2148.

The company is currently recruiting sales people, resellers, distributors, and manufacturing representatives. The Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign is going to offer a 40% discount (save $240) on both the clinical and consumer models on the first 500 units to be pre-sold. About 200 orders have already been placed.

Get in line now if you want the Early Bird Special

# # #

GenYrator Launches Equity Crowdfunding Site for USC Startups Combined with an Entrepreneur Business Accelerator and Mentorship Program

GenYrator is the One of the First Mission-Driven Equity Crowdfunding Platform that Combines Real Returns with Real Impact by Investing in the Next Generation of USC Entrepreneurs

 By Robert Hoskins

Los Angeles, California – GenYrator launched its private beta for an equity crowdfunding site concentrating initially on startups from USC, the alma mater of co-founder Sean Nasiri. The GenYrator platform looks for emerging generation-y founded businesses with revenue that are not quite ready for institutional investors, and encourages regular people to get involved to fill that gap.

GenYrator.com Equity Crowdfunding Site and Business Accelerator for USC Startups

The company is currently being advised by notable figures from both the startup and USC communities. Current advisors include famous venture capitalist and USC Trustee Mark Stevens, former Managing Partner at Sequoia Capital, as well as Alex Cappello, former President of the USC Alumni Association Board of Governors who also served as the only two-time international chairman of YPO. Other notable advisors include Rob Ukropina, former CEO of Overnite Express, who also served on USC Board of Governors, and Ryan Meyers, Managing Director of General Assembly LA and former CEO of AlumniFunder.

“The problem GenYrator is solving,” explains Nasiri, “is that too many good millennial founded startups end prematurely or stagnate because they lack the support they need to grow, and the only way to fix this is by getting everyone involved.” Millennials now have the largest presence in the workforce, but according to the Huffington Post, they are facing the worst job market in more than twenty years. “We are starting businesses out of necessity. There are just not enough opportunities out there for people our age, and we need the support of all generations to create more jobs and grow the economy,” Nasiri continues.

GenYrator has recently achieved proof of concept by helping two companies close their recent rounds. First is wearable technology startup, Loopd, with noteworthy lead investors Tim Draper and Marc Benioff, which closed out its $1M seed round. Second is triple bottom line Hawaiian water bottle company, Waiakea, which closed out its $1.6M dollar Series-A. GenYrator has since opened up its platform to all, but still requires a private beta access code to view deals. It is currently featuring a selection of promising USC-founded companies in “preview mode,” with more being added over the next couple of months.

While investing through equity crowdfunding is only accessible to accredited investors, GenYrator’s unique platform is also open to those who are interested in other ways of helping out, such as being a mentor, advisor, or service provider. The platform also plans to expand beyond just a university platform. “The long-term vision of GenYrator is to establish itself as the premier destination for the next generation of entrepreneurs and leaders,” says Nasiri, “and to show people from all different backgrounds that they can add value and impact the success of a young startup.”

Founded with the mission to generate a more prosperous future through supporting entrepreneurship, GenYrator is the online platform that brings the benefits of the Silicon Valley ecosystem to the mainstream. GenYrator’s online community enables all interested parties, provided they are accredited in accordance with current regulatory guidelines, to directly participate in promising millennial founded businesses. Beyond simply crowdfunding, members and other supporters can lend guidance and mentorship.

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New Equity Crowdfunding Platform iAngels.co Raises $2.25 Million Seed Round from Accredited Investors Who Want to Invest Alongside the Experts

iAngels became the 15^th company to successfully raise funds through the iAngels equity crowdfunding site, raising $1.25 million from some of Israel’s most successful super angel investors

By Robert Hoskins

Tel Aviv, Israel – iAngels is a leading equity crowdfunding platform that enables private investors to co-invest with Startup Nation’s leading angels and gain access to exclusive early-stage opportunities. The iAngels site recently announced that it has raised a $2.25 million Seed Round led by Roman Abramovich’s fund, Millhouse Capital.

iAngels is a leading equity crowdfunding platform that enables private investors to co-invest with Startup Nation’s leading angels and gain access to exclusive early-stage opportunities

iAngels became the 15^th company to successfully raise funds through the iAngels online platform, raising $1.25 million from some of Israel’s most successful angels, and an additional $1 million from its global community of investors within two days.

“We are very confident in the elite angels we’ve identified and their ability to spot the winners,” said Shelly Hod Moyal, Founding Partner at iAngels. “In fact, we’ve structured our business model to take the same risk that investors take when they invest in Israeli startups through the iAngels platform.”

“With iAngels, gone are the days when the crowdfunding platform could make money without the angels themselves succeeding,” added Mor Assia, Founding Partner at iAngels. “High-Net-Worth Individuals are choosing to co-invest with leading Israeli angels through the iAngels platform because they appreciate our unique ability to find and engage Israel’s top performing angels and analyze their investment opportunities to make sound recommendations to our angel community.”

Israel’s elite angels and Roman Abramovich’s fund, Millhouse Capital, subscribe to Assia and Hod Moyal’s rationale. Angel Investors who participated in the Seed Round led by Millhouse Capital include Marc Lasry, Boaz Weinstein, Alex Waislitz, Drew Schaefer, Gigi Levy, David Assia, Daniel Recanati, Yanki Margalit and Marcy Simon.

“iAngels provides unparalleled access to Israel’s best deal flow,” noted Gigi Levy Weiss, iAngels Advisor and one of Israel’s most successful angel investors. “The company’s unique model of investing alongside Israel’s top angels guarantees the quality of the selected companies and helps accredited investors worldwide beat the odds and make money from this coveted asset class.”

The year-old iAngels has already connected its investor community to a robust pipeline of high potential Israeli companies. In 2014, 15 Israeli companies successfully raised capital through the platform, led by the conviction of Israel’s top Angel investors and validated by the wisdom of the iAngels crowd. The iAngels investment portfolio includes promising companies such as TravelersBox, Hello Doctor, Webyclip, Nanorep, Drippler and Biscience.

“We cherry pick only the most promising Israeli startups, selecting only 5% of the investment opportunities we evaluate, said Assia. “Private investors around the world benefit from the due diligence performed by both iAngels and Israel’s top performing angel investors. We expect significant growth in 2015.”

iAngels is an angel investing equity crowdfunding platform that provides accredited investors around the world access to exclusive deals backed by Israel’s top performing early-stage investors under the terms they negotiated.

iAngels founders Mor Assia and Shelly Hod Moyal leverage analytics, visibility and relationships with angels and entrepreneurs to open a closed network of professional investors to the investing public.

By combining the proven experience of professional angel investors with due diligence and analysis, iAngels offers investors the most attractive early-stage investment opportunities in “Startup Nation.” 

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Equity Crowdfunding Provides Colleges and Universities with Easy Access to Early Stage, Seed Round Investment Capital

How Colleges / Universities Can Provide Easy Access to Seed Investment Capital with Equity Crowdfunding Platforms

By Robert Hoskins

Providing Easy Access to Investment Capital 

Providing easy access to seed investment capital is a great way to encourage the creative thinking of young innovators. When money is hard to get, there isn’t much point in trying to be creative. But when students realize that there is a better than average chance of putting together a good business plan and actually being able to raise money to fund their ingenious ideas, Equity crowdfunding will serve as the catalyst that stimulates economic development.

The payoff for students, faculty and universities can be tremendous. It only takes a couple of home run investments to generate a billion dollars in revenue when one of their startups is purchased or takes their company public.  

If you look at the current crop of Angel investors, the large majority got their start by working for a company that went public. Once entrepreneurs strike it rich, they want more.  They don’t cash out and retire.  They reinvest the $10 million they earned into a new pool of startups to help them achieve the same success.  This is what most people mean by mentors.

Successful entrepreneurs love to share their success stories with the next generation. The most important step is to create the first wave of entrepreneurs even if it means a small town in nowhere Texas has to pay Angel Investors and Venture Capitalists from California and New York for their consulting services to get the ball rolling.  All it takes is a small college, smart professors, a few successful investors, a Rewards or Equity-based crowdfunding platform and a team of marketing experts that understand advertising, email marketing, PR and social media.

One company that creates a 1,000 millionaires has the capability to investment up to a billion dollars back into the next round of startups. This is precisely how Silicon Valley was built. For colleges/universities that decide to add an Equity-based Crowdfunding ecosystem, it has the potential to start a huge investment domino effect that will result in a wide-spread, long-term return-on-investment for universities, its faculty, their students and the community around them.

Learn more about crowdfunding:

• Building a Rewards-based and/or Equity-based Crowdfunding Ecosystem;
• Providing Easy Access to Seed Investment Capital with Crowdfunding;
• Generating More Revenue to Support Co-Working Spaces and Startups;
• Using Equity Crowdfunding Sites to Finance Incubators and Accelerators;
• Taking Advantage of Investor Syndicates that are Seeking Better Deal Flow;
• Splitting Revenue from Incubator and Accelerator Mentors Consulting Fees;
• Streamlining Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs);
• Cross-Pollinating College Education with Real World Startups; and
• Learning to Build Better Alumni and Local Community Relationships

 

# # #

Using Equity Crowdfunding Sites to Finance Incubators and Accelerators at Leading U.S. Colleges and Universities

Launching an Equity Crowdfunding Ecosystem to Fund College / University Incubator and Accelerator Programs

By Robert Hoskins

Financing Incubators & Accelerators

Most large colleges and universities in the United States have an Entrepreneurship Center or something similar, but schools in smaller population centers lack the presence of well-staffed Incubators and/or Accelerator programs that are necessary to provide students with access to professional, seasoned business, finance, investment and marketing mentors. The value of providing wisdom gained over 20 to 30 years of real world experience from subject matter experts is a critical part of the startup mentoring process.

And even with the right team of mentors in place, these incubator and accelerator programs will need their own investment syndicate to a yield sufficient pool of investors to amass enough investment seed capital to fund startups that advance from an incubator to an accelerator program.

The benefits of providing investment capital are clear to everyone but sometimes the biggest challenge for smaller communities is aggregating the first million dollars to get started and maybe another 4 million dollars to keep the program funded until startups progress far enough to be purchased by a larger company or go through an Initial Public Offering (IPO).

The minimum startup capital needed to finance 10 startups per year at $100,000 each will require at least a million dollars. Sometimes there simply are not enough local resources to achieve this goal.  This challenge showcases the value of equity crowdfunding sites and how marketing equity crowdfunding sites on the internet can make it possible for remote angel investors and venture capitalists to shop for potential investment opportunities at your school from anywhere in the world.

SBIR/SBTT Technology Transfer Programs

Colleges and universities can also tap into federal funding via Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) or Small Business Technology Transfer (SBTT) programs that offer up to $2 billion per year of funding for university incubators and accelerator programs.  Competition is fierce for this funding, but with right application it is possible to obtain funding.

Learn more about crowdfunding:

• Building a Rewards-based and/or Equity-based Crowdfunding Ecosystem;
• Providing Easy Access to Seed Investment Capital with Crowdfunding;
• Generating More Revenue to Support Co-Working Spaces and Startups;
• Using Equity Crowdfunding Sites to Finance Incubators and Accelerators;
• Taking Advantage of Investor Syndicates that are Seeking Better Deal Flow;
• Splitting Revenue from Incubator and Accelerator Mentors Consulting Fees;
• Streamlining Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs);
• Cross-Pollinating College Education with Real World Startups; and
• Learning to Build Better Alumni and Local Community Relationships

 

# # #

Want to learn more about equity crowdfunding?

Please fill out this form to get started:

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Setting Up a New College – University Equity Investment Crowdfunding Site to Take Advantage of the Growing U.S. Investor Network Suffering from a Lack of Deal Flow

Schools that Launch Equity Crowdfunding Sites Now Will Learn How to Market Investment Opportunities to Accredited Investors and Get a Head Start on the Vast Amount of Money that Will Flood the U.S. when the SEC Finally Approves Title III Crowdfunding Guidelines

By Robert Hoskins

Investor Surplus, Deal Flow Shortage

Believe it or not, there is a growing surplus of angel investors, accredited investors and venture capitalists that have the money to invest in new startups, but cannot find enough good deals being circulated by entrepreneurs and startups that need investment startup capital.  

A recent member of the San Francisco Angel Group member recently said that there many startups in San Francisco currently receiving seed investment that really are not worthy of seed investment capital, but are getting lucky because there is a surplus of money and a shortage of good deals. 

The good news is that college and universities can now take advantage of a new rule passed as a part of the JOBS Act, which approved something known as General Solicitation. For the past 80 years it has been illegal to advertise or market private equity deals to the general public, but that ban has been lifted. 

In November 2014, a new SEC rule was passed that makes it possible to advertise private placement memorandums (PPMs) to approximately 8.7 million accredited investors throughout the United States and abroad.  This is great news because only about 3% of all accredited investors are active angel investors. This means that 97%  of this group has never been approached by startups seeking investment capital. 

This means that any school can setup an equity crowdfunding platform and start marketing their local community’s entrepreneur and startup business plans to a nationwide or global network of accredited investors.  Once a platform is setup, investors with the right credentials can search through the platform’s online equity investment opportunities on a 24x 7 basis.

And then, hopefully in October 2015, the SEC also will pass the final rules that open up Title III equity crowdfunding to every adult in the United States who is 18 years or older. When that happens, the same equity crowdfunding site will have the ability market deals to every adult in America or approximately 180 million new investors.  Take that with a grain of salt because the new Title III rules are three years overdue, but if they do make it to the Federal Registry there will be flood of money seeking great business plans and startups who need startup capital.

In order to leverage the growing pool of accredited investors now, colleges and universities should begin the process of setting up a streamlined equity crowdfunding ecosystem as soon as possible. It will open up schools to a nationwide and/or global network of angel investors now and help them get a head start on the vast amount of money that will flood the marketplace when the SEC finally approves the Title III crowdfunding guidelines.

Learn more about crowdfunding:

• Building a Rewards-based and/or Equity-based Crowdfunding Ecosystem;
• Providing Easy Access to Seed Investment Capital with Crowdfunding;
• Generating More Revenue to Support Co-Working Spaces and Startups;
• Using Equity Crowdfunding Sites to Finance Incubators and Accelerators;
• Taking Advantage of Investor Syndicates that are Seeking Better Deal Flow;
• Splitting Revenue from Incubator and Accelerator Mentors Consulting Fees;
• Streamlining Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs);
• Cross-Pollinating College Education with Real World Startups; and
• Learning to Build Better Alumni and Local Community Relationships

 

# # #

Want to learn more about setting up an equity crowdfunding platform?

Please fill out this form to get start:

Name(required)

Cell Phone(required)

Email

Submit

Δ

Starting a University Equity Crowdfunding Ecosystem to Build Better Alumni and Local Community Relationships

Crowdfunding Sites Provide Alumni with a Personal Way to Begin Investing in their Alma Maters’ Promising Startups and Reap the Benefit of Making a Lot of Money if They Invest in the Right Projects

By Robert Hoskins

Stimulating Alumni and Local Community Engagement

Establishing an Equity Crowdfunding Ecosystem is a great way for colleges and universities to reconnect alumni with their alma maters and engage them to begin investing in the school’s future.  

Unlike giving donations to a school with no idea of how the money is going to be spent, investing directly in equity crowdfunding campaigns not only gives alumni a way to give back to the university that that helped launch their careers, but also provides them with a personal way to begin investing in creative projects that are near and dear to their hearts as well as reap the benefit of making a lot of money if they invest in the right projects.

Building an Equity Crowdfunding site to market college and university projects to alumni and the rest of the world can help:

• Build Better Relationships with Alumni;
• Migrate Alumni from Blind Donations to Targeted Equity Investments;
• Generate Substantially More Revenue to Finance School Programs;
• Increase Long-Term Return on Investment; and
• Produce Much Better  Global University Marketing Opportunities.

Equity Crowdfunding Sites are Great Marketing Tools

Not only do crowdfunding campaigns provide a great opportunity for students to raise money for their startup companies, but the marketing that is done to drive investors to their crowdfunding profiles is a great way for colleges and universities to market their school’s brand name and recruit new students in a similar manner to running TV advertisements during college football and basketball games.

The difference, however, is that instead of producing a bland 10,000 ft. overview of a college’s academics, research and development facilities and a fly over of the university campus, each equity crowdfunding campaign has the opportunity of demonstrate exactly what is actually going on inside their R&D departments, computer science data centers and bio-tech wet labs. It is a new way to streamline the Technology Transfer process.  

Equity Crowdfunding is a much more cost-effective way to bring new technology and businesses to market and can earn schools substantially more money via equity investments than licensing agreements or royalty deals. 

Entrepreneurship Centers, Incubators and Accelerators

In addition, crowdfunding sites allow schools to promote the fact that they are now offering entrepreneurship centers, co-working spaces, incubators with mentorship programs and accelerators that can help raise money to fund new startups.  Equity crowdfunding ecosystems and alumni angel networks will make is possible to attract more millennials, smarter entrepreneurs and aggressive startup high-tech and bio-tech companies seeking a fertile environment in which to launch their business ideas.

For example, look at the successful marketing campaigns that the Coolest Cooler or the Pebble Time SmartWatch crowdfunding campaigns are generating for Kickstarter.  Not only are they transforming Kickstarter into a global brand, but with 18 days left to go the Pebble Time SmartWatch has raised over $17 million. These marketing, PR and social media campaigns have generated massive amounts of free, positive and credible publicity. The same type of exposure can be generated for any college that has startups marketing their university’s equity crowdfunding campaigns via the internet and social media networks.  

Equity Crowdfunding Generates Nice Revenue Streams

Not only is the free, positive publicity great for promoting a school’s brand name, but collecting a fee similar to Kickstarter’s five-percent crowdfunding site commission fee is also a great way to make money to fund the school’s incubator and accelerator programs.

For example, the Pebble Time SmartWatch crowdfunding campaign’s site commission fee will deposit more than $1,000,000 into Kickstarter’s bank account for doing little more than setting up an e-commerce site. A simple task for any computer science college. 

College and university crowdfunding sites will start slow at first like Kickstarter did but given the strength of the university’s mass communication department, it could be much quicker.  Regardless, over a five-year period, a school’s crowdfunding site has the same opportunity to create a massive crowdfunding ecosystem like Kickstarter’s which to date has collected almost ~$2 billion in investment seed capital over the past 5 years.  

It you are a school administrator, what would injecting $2 billion into your Technology Transfer Office do for your college or university?  And that is straight rewards-based crowdfunding.  What would the same $2 billion return if just 10% percent of your startup companies went public and raised $100 million each? Once the first several dominos fall the financial returns would sufficient enough to continue growing a stronger pool of wealth with each generation of graduates. This method is precisely how Palo Alto, San Jose and San Francisco built the Silicon Valley in California into a global angel investor and venture capital powerhouse.

Alumni, Mentors and Future Students

Future students, leading mentors and disconnected alumni will suddenly have a purview into exciting projects and developments that are percolating behind the scenes in a very similar manner to Kickstarter. Crowdfunding will make it possible for the local community and general public to see the huge innovations that are going on behind the scenes, which will create the desire to get involved in the process so they too can strike it rich. Suddenly, alumni will be very motivated to keep in touch and invest often. 

Conclusion:

The crowdfunding industry is clearly fueling a new generation of makers that realize that it is more possible now than ever to bring their creative ideas to life with other people’s money, not just on the east and west coasts, but anywhere in America.

Learn more about crowdfunding:

• Building a Rewards-based and/or Equity-based Crowdfunding Ecosystem;
• Providing Easy Access to Seed Investment Capital with Crowdfunding;
• Generating More Revenue to Support Co-Working Spaces and Startups;
• Using Equity Crowdfunding Sites to Finance Incubators and Accelerators;
• Taking Advantage of Investor Syndicates that are Seeking Better Deal Flow;
• Splitting Revenue from Incubator and Accelerator Mentors Consulting Fees;
• Streamlining Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs);
• Cross-Pollinating College Education with Real World Startups; and
• Learning to Build Better Alumni and Local Community Relationships

 

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Symbid Launches New Crowdfunding Network with 30,000 Investors for Providing Traditional and Alternative Finance to Start-ups and Small Businesses in Europe

The Funding Network is one of the first comprehensive online platforms for SME finance, providing entrepreneurs with direct access to equity and loan crowdfunding, bank loans, venture capital, angel investors and investment funds

By Robert Hoskins

Rotterdam, The Netherlands – Symbid, a go-to equity crowdfunding platform connecting small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to all types of funding, traditional and alternative, announced the launch of The Funding Network, which represents the next phase in the evolution of the peer-to-peer fundraising model in the European financial industry.

Symbid’s The Funding Network is one of the first comprehensive online platforms for SME finance

All over the world people are becoming better connected, creating cheaper, faster and easier access to products and services. Entire industries are being concentrated into single online destinations – termed ‘go-to’ platforms – disrupting as well as simplifying the way we live our lives.

The Funding Network is the first comprehensive online platform for SME finance, providing entrepreneurs with direct access to equity and loan crowdfunding, bank loans, venture capital, angel investors and investment funds. Built around user-friendly investing, monitoring and data tools that enable everyone to track the performance of companies 24/7, The Funding Network bridges the information gap between crowdfunding and traditional investment methods through standardized data protocols.

“Our mission at Symbid is to simplify the way small businesses are funded through technology that enables a more transparent and efficient way of doing business. The launch of The Funding Network in the home of the world’s first stock market is a step towards a more democratic financial future for us all,” said Korstiaan Zandvliet, CEO and co-founder of Symbid Corp. “As an early mover in crowdfunding, we pushed ahead with paradigm-shifting technologies that help to level the financial playing field for investors and entrepreneurs. This is a logical evolution for a financial industry still grounded in a traditional, vertical, offline way of operating. The Funding Network will be the most efficient capital market for private companies.”

The Funding Network gives entrepreneurs access to all forms of finance, while offering (private and institutional) investors full transparency on the potential risks and returns of their portfolio. Every entrepreneur connecting to The Funding Network is guided towards the right type of funding with professional financial advice. Meanwhile, investors can personalize their deal flow according to key business criteria, pinpointing the investment opportunities that matter to them. This produces the most effective capital allocation service possible, underpinned by standardized XBRL data streamed from accountant reporting systems.

With over 40 funding partners already connected including banks, venture capitalists, angel investors, 30,000 private (crowdfunding) investors and affiliate platforms, the launch of The Funding Network™ on March 4 is just the beginning for Symbid. A signed partnership with financial advisory firm Credion means the expected total transaction volume of The Funding Network™ in 2015 is $800 million. “Symbid aims to revolutionize the financial industry in a way that enables more people to connect, fund and grow. We have but one message: let’s invest in each other,” said Korstiaan Zandvliet.

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Front Page PR Seeks Startups at Texas Incubators Accelerators that Would Like to Try a New Method of Raising Seed Investment Capital via Texas Equity Crowdfunding Sites

Equity crowdfunding campaigns have the ability to help entrepreneurs raise enough seed capital to pay for a co-working space and put together marketing and business development plans to gain market traction

By Robert Hoskins

Austin, Texas – Front Page PR, in tandem with the Texas Crowdfunding Network, is now offering entrepreneurs, startups and businesses in Texas the opportunity to learn how to use top Texas crowdfunding sites to raise enough seed investment capital to get their companies up and running. Anyone interested in a free 30-minute crowdfunding consulting session to learn more about crowdfunding should call Robert Hoskins at (512) 627-6622 or send a tweet to @Crowdfunding_PR.

Front Page PR Helps Startups and Small Businesses Plan Successful Texas Equity Crowdfunding Campaigns

“Various Texas incubators and accelerators offer attractive deals that promise to provide $50,000 of matching funds and another $50,000 from venture capital partners for any company as long as they can bring their own $50,000 to the table,” said Robert Hoskins, the Texas Crowdfunding Network’s Executive Director. “The problem is that most startups are bootstrapping their companies and do not have enough money to qualify for these types of expensive cash-up-front accelerator programs.”

“Even though incubators/accelerators have the best intentions of helping startups,” Hoskins added. “There are simply too many startups and not enough seed investment capital to go around. According to a leading Austin Accelerator Research Report even the top Texas accelerators rarely invest more than a total of $150,000 per year in startups. At $50k per deal that means only enough funding for three companies per year.”

Recognizing this widespread problem, the Texas State Securities Board created a new source of alternative financing called “Equity Crowdfunding” that provides businesses, including Texas incubators and accelerators, with a new way to raise enough seed investment capital to fund more companies, create more jobs and stimulate more economic development in Texas.

Equity crowdfunding sites now allow businesses to build an online business pitch called a “crowdfunding profile,” which can be viewed by prospective investors 24-hours-a-day, 7-days-a-week. Investors that like deals they find can purchase equity shares via online Texas crowdfunding sites in a similar manner to how Kickstarter and IndieGoGo or ecommerce sites work.

It is completely free to build a crowdfunding profile. And spending as little as $5,000 to $20,000 to produce the necessary pitch deck/video, disclosure documentation and targeted marketing campaigns to drive investors to crowdfunding profiles makes it possible for any Texas business raise up to $1,000,000 of seed investment capital per year.

Every adult in Texas can now invest up to $5,000 per year in equity investment deals they like. At $5,000 each, a small business only needs 200 investors to raise up to $1 million per year. Marketing campaigns with an average 3% response rate have the potential to drive up to 600,000 Texas investors to a company’s crowdfunding profile. And then, it only takes a very small conversion rate of those investors investing anywhere from $500 to $5,000 each to reach the desired crowdfunding goal.

When trying to raise seed capital most angel investors like to see some sort of traction in the marketplace. Smart companies will only try to raise enough money to deliver a finished product/service that can be sold as well as some marketing programs to begin customer acquisition.

After a successful first round, companies that spend their money wisely and build a solid customer base will be able to raise larger secondary and tertiary rounds as they gain momentum in the marketplace.

“Raising multiple rounds of funding to stair step their way into a successful business model is a good strategy to develop a loyal base of customers and crowdfunding investors,” Hoskins commented. “It is also a great way catch the eye of angel investors and venture capitalists who will be watching Texas Crowdfunding sites for rising stars that are still at an early stage, but growing quickly.”

Front Page PR has a 25-year track record of helping small startups launch their businesses and begin rolling out their products and services to local, regional, national and global markets. Using integrated marketing campaigns that harness the power of targeted content marketing, email marketing, PR and social media, Front Page PR can help any small business build a loyal customer base and begin preparing for a successful equity crowdfunding campaign. Front Page PR offers up to a 50% discount on various marketing services for qualified members of Texas-based co-working spaces, incubators and accelerator programs.

If your business would like to learn more about the Texas Equity Crowdfunding industry, please join our free Texas Crowdfunding Network Meetup Group or visit our Texas Equity Crowdfunding Blog to read more about how to setup a Texas Crowdfunding Portal or Issue a Texas Equity Crowdfunding Offering. We can also help setup Equity Crowdfunding Community Outreach Programs and Crowdfunding Training Programs to educate members of chambers of commerce, SBDC offices, economic development councils and large business associations on how to capitalize on equity crowdfunding to fund startups that need access to seed investment capital. 

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Contact:
Robert Hoskins
Front Page PR
(512) 627-6622
@Crowdfunding_PR
www.linkedin.com/in/roberthoskins