Blog

Australians collectively send an estimated 1.2 billion single-use paper coffee cups to landfill every year. The ‘keep cup’ seems to have made only a minimal difference to this number. We interview brothers Marty & Jeremy Rowell, the inventors of The Cup eXchange, Australia’s single use coffee cup solution.

There is plenty of advice handed out when you first decide to undertake an equity crowdfunding raise…….you must have a strong and engaged crowd of customers and supporters, a unique product that will grab attention, and a powerful marketing strategy that is going to convert those who are interested in your company into investors.

We have recently completed our 100th transaction.  OnMarket launched its B2C platform in October 2015, approximately 1,000 days ago.  OnMarket, which is now approaching 50,000 members, provides retail investors with access to over one third of all IPOs on the ASX.

For proprietary companies, the wait is over to take advantage of the equity crowdfunding movement. An amendment to the 2017 equity crowdfunding legislation was passed in Federal Parliament last week allowing private Australian companies to raise capital through equity crowdfunding. 

Alternative non-VC sources of financing are growing rapidly and giving entrepreneurs many more choices than in the past. But can they co-exist? Let’s look at a couple of different options to venture capital.

The golden era is well and truly over for Australia’s major banks. After decades of dominating the nation’s finance sector, their long-held position of power is under threat. Anti-bank sentiment among consumers is widespread, and innovative new competitors are offering alternatives to the traditional banking system.

Imagine if all those virtual gold bars and coins you accumulate while video gaming suddenly became real gold.

With the world’s fiat currencies under increasing pressure and cryptocurrencies yet to achieve stability, digital gold is proving an attractive alternative.

OnMarket has successfully closed its third equity crowdfunding offer with PT Blink, raising $815K from 468 investors.

The current money exchange system is fundamentally flawed, which was highlighted by the Global Financial Crisis that began in 2009. To stabilise after the crisis began the world’s central banks embarked on “temporary emergency” measures that continue to this day.

In just over 2 years, we’ve brought to OnMarket members the opportunity to invest in almost 100 capital raises.  The OnMarket platform provides access to everyone to invest in both IPO and equity crowdfunding offers. Here’s some of our highlights and a chance to see if you did or didn’t miss out on some of our best so far.

A report by PwC, ‘Women Unbound’, shows that crowdfunding is challenging embedded gender bias in the entrepreneurial and finance industry. We are seeing women-led crowdfunded campaigns reaching their target more often than campaigns led by the historically favoured men.

Not all IPOs are created equal. If you’re going to put your hard earned cash into the public float of a company, what are the markers of a good investment? 

OnMarket has been awarded the 2018 FinTech Australia award for ‘Excellence in Crowdfunding’ at the recent Finnies Awards held in Sydney.

IPO stands for Initial public offering. We have heard the question many times before: “Why do they use the term public when it plainly isn’t?”

New laws that allow everyday Australians to become early-stage investors in business start-ups have already attracted thousands of people willing to inject their cash. Before the new equity crowd funding laws were passed, investing in startups was restricted to wealthy angel investors and venture capitalists. 

Becoming a Sophisticated or Experienced investor with OnMarket means even greater access to investment opportunities, and for sophisticated investors no limit on the amount you can invest each Equity Crowdfunding offer. 

Are you one of the OnMarket members who haven’t yet downloaded the OnMarket app?   

The OnMarket app has now been downloaded by over 11,000 of our members. Since we launched it in late 2015 it has been used for over 80+ investment opportunities that OnMarket has successfully facilitated.

OnMarket has successfully closed the world’s most popular equity crowdfunding offer. Solar energy retailer DC Power Co. has crowdfunded close to $2.2m from approximately 15,000 investors. DC Power Co. is “Australia’s first solar focused energy retailer” which optimises household solar systems to use less energy and earn more money.

Would you have preferred a slice of cash ($20,000) over a T-shirt? This case study highlights the simple but very profound distinction between equity crowdfunding and rewards-based crowdfunding.

OnMarket has successfully closed Australia’s first equity crowdfunding offer. Revvies Energy Strips Limited has become the first company in Australia to raise capital by utilising the government’s new equity crowdfunding legislation, the Crowd-Sourced Funding Act 2017. 

OnMarket was the very proud winner of the 2018 ‘Crowdfunding Innovator of the Year’ at the recent FinTech Business Awards held in Sydney. Read more here

In a new series of articles called ‘Investor Story’ we interview different OnMarket members each month. We ask them to talk about their motivation for investing, what crucial factors they look for before investing in a company, and what they think about equity crowdfunding.