Right here’s an attention-grabbing transfer. Founders Future, a well known VC agency within the French tech ecosystem, acquired an fairness crowdfunding market known as Sowefund. Whereas phrases of the deal stay undisclosed, Sowefund has been worthwhile since 2022 with round 20 workers.

Following this transfer, Founders Future now has two separate but complementary companies. With its VC funds, which I’ve just lately lined, Founders Future raises cash from restricted companions, which embody skilled buyers and household workplaces, after which invests in promising startups. In different phrases, it’s VC as ordinary.

With its crowdfunding platform, it matches retail buyers with startups that need to elevate cash from their neighborhood of customers or from private finance consultants who need to diversify their financial savings with dangerous however probably rewarding investments. Going ahead, Founders Future and Sowefund will nonetheless function utterly individually — there received’t be any synergy between these two actions.

So why would a VC agency go downstream and purchase a crowdfunding platform?

“We seen two main traits. The primary pattern, which you have got actually seen, is that you’ve a brand new technology of buyers who need to get extra fingers on — with each private and non-private firms. They need transparency they usually need to put money into the actual economic system,” Founders Future founder and CEO Marc Menasé informed me.

“The second commentary we’ve made is that, our job with the fund may be very skilled and really disciplined in its day-to-day strategy. And we will convey these strategies to an organization concerned in crowdfunding financing. And it’s true that this hasn’t been accomplished a lot,” Menasé added.

And Founders Future has already seen how crowdfunding firms work with a few of the agency’s portfolio firms — as an illustration, Taster and 900.care raised some cash on Crowdcube, the British funding platform that expanded to France in 2022.

Elevating the bar for fairness crowdfunding

Sowefund’s two co-founders Benjamin Wattinne and Georges Viglietti will stay on the helm of the crowdfunding platform going ahead. However Founders Future has a multi-million funding plan to develop Sowefund’s workforce within the coming 12 months or two.

“What we need to do is convey our know-how to make sure that Sowefund turns into extra skilled and actually the go-to platform for co-investment with professionals. That’s actually what we need to obtain,” Menasé stated.

Since 2014, Sowefund has dealt with 103 crowdfunding campaigns. General, firms have raised €81 million from greater than 110,000 retail buyers (that’s $86 million at immediately’s trade fee) — no phrase on the efficiency of those investments. Latest campaigns embody Ekwateur, Agriloops, Lunii, Axioma, Extracadabra and Futura Gaïa.

Extra just lately, Sowefund obtained an settlement to be licensed as a European crowdfunding service supplier. It means it will probably function in different European international locations sooner or later.

However the Sowefund workforce (and Founders Future) need to go one step additional relying on regulatory modifications. Finally, Sowefund want to supply the chance to put money into funds, corresponding to VC funds, affect funds, and so forth. However that’s not but potential.

Founders Future’s transfer can be attention-grabbing due to the timing. VC investments have slowed down over the previous couple of years all over the world. As many VC corporations are nonetheless passing on offers that might have made sense just a few years in the past, it’s time for startup CEOs to search out artistic methods to increase their runways.

“The potential funding pool amongst people is big. So you have got individuals who need to put money into firms they know and use — or they’ve a constructive sentiment for these firms. And there are an enormous variety of them,” Menasé stated. “So I feel what’s nice about fairness crowdfunding is that it’s an alternate or a complement in a context the place financing is troublesome for firms.”