Ten Thousand Projects Financed

Ten Thousand Projects Financed In 2011, the year of Kickstarter's second birthday, the crowdfunding site recorded nearly 11,836 successfully funded projects (about 44% of all the projects submitted) with more than $99 million pledged. The year showed phenomenal growth over the previous one when 3,910 successful projects were launched with $27 million pledged. Kickstarter is already the world's largest funding platform for creative projects. The majority of projects on Kickstarter are cr...

Entrepreneurship crowdfunding dream is coming true

Entrepreneurship crowdfunding dream is coming true The US House of Representatives has passed, by a walloping majority (407 t0 17), the Bill called HR 2930: Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act. It now needs to pass in the Senate, but is hardly likely to fail. This new legislation is very important for the vast majority of entrepreneurs seeking to raise up to $5 million in equity funding, by means of crowdfunding. Crowdfunding is a way of raising relatively modest sums of money on the Intern...

Crowdfunding may get a Congressional boost

Crowdfunding may get a Congressional boost In September, President Obama included a crowdfunding exemption in his proposed jobs bill, and there is a bill in congress (HR 2930 McHenry) that proposes a very similar exemption.  It is elegant in its simplicity! It includes  provisions that: creates a crowdfunding exemption from the federal registration requirements for offerings of up to $5 million with each investor investing a maximum of the lesser of $10,000 and ten percent of the investor'...

Virgina Benefit Corporations

Virgina Benefit Corporations Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell has signed legislation that will make Virginia the fourth state to allow stock corporations to become Benefit Corporations (B Corps). The bill had unanimously passed both the Virginia State Senate and the Viriginia State legislature. Governor McDonnell signed HB 2358 on March 26, 2011 and the legislation will take effect on July 1, 2011. Previous states that have adopted B Corp legislation include Maryland, Vermont (where the le...

Revenue-Based Funding

Revenue-Based Funding I am delighted to see that revenue-based funding is becoming a growing competitor for equity and bank–not least because I was a beneficiary of such borrowing back in 1982. The advantage to entrepreneurs is that the loan is based on your forecast revenues and repayments are in the form of royalties on them. So some people call them royalty-based loans. Thanks to Thomas Thurston of Growth Science International for the illustration to the left. The benefit for the ...

Raising finance meets brand marketing

Raising finance meets brand marketing Profunder.com, the brainchild of Jessica Jackley, co-founder of kiva.org, it the tip of a silver-lined iceberg. Crowdfunding is a significant way to go for people who want to start a business. Crowdfunding is using the Internet to pitch your project to a mass audience, or just your friends and family. Raising money for your startup can be a huge and often unsuccessful effort. Crowdfunding, crowd finance or raising crowd capital can be a much mor...

Revenue Sharing Loans

Revenue Sharing Loans Wonderful way to borrow One of the founders of the non-profit kiva.org, the crowdsourcing microlending site, Jessica Jackley has built on the idea and Kiva's experience to establish a wonderful site for venture founders: profounder.com. What's wonderful is that loans are made from your network who are inspired by your pitch to back your new startup business. But rather than having to give away equity or get saddled with regular interest payment on a loan, the investo...

Small Biz Profits Growth 2010

US Small Biz Profits Growth 2010 Vermont Top State According to Inc. Magazine's Small Business Blog, the US State where small business profits were growing the fastest in 2010, was the State of Vermont. This is very interesting, given that Vermont is only rated 37th out of 50 in the CNBC Top States for Business rankings for 2010. Source: Inc. Magazine Forbes magazine placed Vermont 45th in their Best States for Business rankings in 2010. In the Tax Foundation's 2011 State Business ...

Edgewalkers Go Out-preneuring

Edgewalkers Go Out-preneuring What's an edgewalker? Judi Neal says they are people "who walk between worlds and have the ability to build bridges between different world views. They have a strong spiritual life and also very grounded and effective in the evryday world. They have five qualities of being: self-awareness passion integrity vision playfulness. Why would such people go out-preneuring. What's out-preneuring? Out-preneurs are those employees who want to create thei...

For Benefit Corporation: a Vermont first

Vermont Benefit Corporation Act The goal of for-profit companies is, naturally enough, to make profits. Legislation has been introduced in Vermont that would allow companies to exist for other reasons — providing a social good for the community while returning gains to investors. Such companies would register as a “beneficial corporation.” “This bill proposes to allow new and existing for-profit corporations to elect status as a for-benefit corporation with the purpose, among other thin...