Crowdfunding platform Indiegogo and its partner MicroVentures now lists Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) and blockchain investments on Indiegogo’s online platform.Indiegogo’s online platform began in 2008 as a crowdfunding website for innovations in tech and design. Since then, they’ve developed new offerings and launched Equity Crowdfunding in 2016, allowing anyone to invest in new startups.With initial coin offerings surging past $4 billion USD ($4.97 billion CAD) in 2017, according to their blog post, Indiegogo sees digital token sales as a means of providing “greater utility and liquidity to investors than traditional investment instruments.”The crowdfunding platform believes that they can leverage “a decade of fundraising experience” to become the leading, reliable and global platform for ICOs. With a large and diverse user base, Indiegogo can open up ICO accessibility to the general public. Their robust compliance standards will also hopefully ensure that pre-sales abide by current regulations to protect sellers and investors.They recently launched their first ICO called the Fan Controlled Football League (FCFL). The FCFL raised $5,206,985 USD ($6,467,856.42 CAD) from 558 investors.
With the recent popularity in ICOs, Indiegogo has positioned itself as a global hub for ICOs. The company mentioned that embracing ICOs was a natural progression regarding their future trajectory. As mentioned in their blog post, Indiegogo sees launching ICOS as “ simply another way of doing what we’ve been working on for the past decade…We’re ready to become the go-to platform for selling and investing in digital tokens and blockchain-based assets, and we can’t wait for you to join us.”Indiegogo mentioned that their ease of accessibility, robust compliance, and curated selection make it the ideal place for token sales. With over 10 million monthly visitors, the Indiegogo team is committed to ensuring that token sales are understandable to the wider public.Although ICO laws are continually evolving, Indiegogo will work with MicroVentures to offer ICOs in an SEC-compliant way. They will also be vetting and sourcing all ICOs. “We want to bring a brand of trust to the entire industry, which we think will bring ICOs to the mainstream,” said Slava Rubin, one of the founders of Indiegogo, to the New York Times.
The FCLF is United State’s first democratized sports league. As listed on MicroVentures, their goal is to create a professional league that combines “the passion of live sport, the competition of fantasy sports, the engagement of video games, and the global reach of eSports.” Unlike traditional professional leagues, fans in the league's blockchain network make the calling decisions regarding player personnel and real-time play. Instead of viewing the sport, the fans become the coaches and managers of their teams. Fans can now engage, interact and contribute to the sport.“For the FCFL to work, we need full transparency - we need fans to have full confidence that their votes are in fact driving the action,” said Sohrob Farudi, the chief executive of the FCLF in an FCFL blog post. “It is critical that we have 100 percent buy-in from all parties involved. Blockchain solves this issue of trust.”Although Indiegogo’s compliance rules create restrictions for investors and sellers, Farudi was willing to accept the restrictions. “We want to be sure that nobody on our side is going to jail and that when we bring this product to market that it will be done the right way,” said Farudi.With FCLF’s successful crowdfunding, Indiegogo can potentially become the new global hub for ICOs. They believe that digital token sales are “a powerful way to help people unite around ideas that matter to them and together make them come to life.”Image credit: Indiegogo logo
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