Crowdfunding seems to be "less than adequate stamina"

Yang Rui

In the tide of Internet finance billows, compared to popular P2P industry, equity crowdfunding seems to be some "lack of stamina." The concept of crowdfunding "fire" after what areas, what projects seem to want to crowdfunding here, "a share."

On July 25, Zhang Xiaojun, CSRC spokesman, said that as the relevant regulatory rules on equity crowdfunding, the SFC has now completed a number of rounds of industry research and the relevant rules are being stepped up in the research and formulation process. According to the "First Financial Daily" reporter understands that the deferral of regulatory details in addition to remaining controversial with the industry threshold, the development stage of the industry is also one of the factors considered by regulators.

According to a source close to the regulators, "the equity crowdfunding industry in China is still in its early stages of development, which is of great significance to start-ups, but it still faces many challenges in the operation of specific cases." Up to now, the equity crowdfunding industry has matured Less cases, the industry camp has not formed the scale, and from the front of the crowdfunding platform and the success of the back end of the first case of successful crowdfunding case, equity crowdfunding is still rapidly moving forward.

Fund raising crowdfunding management

Among the three types of Crowdfunding models, Crowdfunding has been at the cusp of crowdfunding, which is related to the mode and platform features of Crowdfunding. The essence of the crowdfunding model is to eliminate the intermediate links of traditional financing, to improve the efficiency of financing and reduce transaction costs significantly, and equity crowdfunding for promoting the development of start-ups is very meaningful, both to help solve the financing problems common to demand side, But also to meet the supply side to support the development of start-ups and share the growth benefits of start-ups.

More fundamentally, equity crowdfunding is an early, fragmented angel investment. The first domestic Internet crowdfunding platform that broke into equity financing "forbidden land" We cast the founder Li Qunlin once defined the meaning of equity crowdfunding with the "All-China Angel Time".

At present, there are still relatively few mature cases in the ongoing equity crowdfunding industry. Among them, the United Micro Media is the first case of the domestic equity crowdfunding industry, but also the fastest-growing case at present. At the beginning of last year, Zhu Jiang, founder of Microl Media, publicly raised shares on Taobao, sparking heated discussions on "online private placement" and crowdfunding of shares.

After experiencing many challenges and suspending the turmoil, Zhujiang sells stocks twice to attract 1193 shareholders and raise funds of 3.87 million yuan. The founder of the first Crowdfunding model told First Financial Daily: "Crowdfunding operations and management are one of the things the SFC has always been concerned with. Crowdfunding of shares is a very troublesome thing because at After crowdfunding is completed, the startups' products and governance will be affected by crowdfunding while a complete and efficient system of institutions is needed for investor exchanges, information disclosure and investor conferences. "

In addition to the discussion on the regulatory boundary, the case of Mega Media also reflects the puzzles of domestic entrepreneurs who choose equity crowdfunding in how to design products, how to deal with the relationship between a large number of small investors, how to deal with information disclosure, etc. And explore. Zhu Jiang also wrote in his new book: "The so-called core of crowdfunding management actually does not mean the business aspect of the company, but how do you ensure that the information communication between shareholders and the company is reciprocal and smooth."

According to Zhu Jiang said: "The next project is also brewing, in addition to the previous angel investment, this will also be the flagship crowdfunding platform with NetEase's financial cooperation and Baidu, through crowdfunding to raise funds, which set for the Private investors hold 20% of public crowdfunding, while non-public crowdfunding accounts for 20%. Non-public parts are provided to professional investment institutions at 200,000 shares, each accounting for 1%. "

In fact, the challenges faced by equity crowdfunding come from many aspects. First, although the threshold of public participation is greatly reduced, the risk of investment is not changed. In addition, the access threshold for qualified investors after fragmented investment is also an important consideration for legal regulation in all countries.

The Crowdfunding Industry White Paper shows that equity crowdfunding platforms in all countries set the bar for qualified investors to meet legal or industry regulations. According to the "First Financial Daily" reporter understands that in the domestic regulatory details of the draft for the individual investor's investment amount and qualified investors have done a clear standard, and for the withdrawal of investors and equity lock, Investment can be unconditional exit in a certain period has also made provisions.

Platform model differentiation

Crowdfunding in the forefront of entrepreneurs, it is a lot of equity crowdfunding platform choice. At present, the total number of equity crowdfunding platforms has no authoritative data to draw lessons from. However, according to the incomplete statistics of the "First Financial Daily," there are currently about 20 to 30 platforms positioned for equity crowdfunding. Compared with the crowdfunding of commodities, the equity crowdfunding has been developing slowly due to the late start of development, the relatively low level of investor acceptance and the complicated procedures.

At present, the crowdfunding of equity investment can be broadly divided into two types of individual direct investment and collective investment. In the current status of several well-known platforms, broadly divided into four camps. The first is to locate the "angel exchange" of high-end investors. Although Angel Ning Platform founder Lanning Yu publicly denied that he belonged to the equity crowdfunding platform, from the perspective of "Angel Exchange" to intermediation, "Angel Exchange" It is accepted by everyone as belonging to the equity crowdfunding industry.

According to Lan Ning-yu's explanation, crowdfunding is actually a description of the function of "quick co-investment" of the angel remittance. In the rapid convergence of Angel Exchange, a lead investor plays a central role in project evaluation, with many options and investment candidates. Entrepreneurs not only have access to funding but also additional value such as more industry resources than money and management experience. The surface looks like crowdfunding, but in fact investors are specific groups and not for the general public.

Statistics show that as of the end of last year, Angel Exchange has registered 53,000 entrepreneurs, 20,000 registered start-ups, 12,000 registered investors and over 200 national cooperation incubators. From the current Angel Exchange project point of view, coverage and area is also very wide.

The second camp is positioned as "all the people, angel," investment platform, participation in projects and investment quotas relative angel exchange is low. The "Everyone Casts" official website said that it is China's first "Crowdfunding Model" angel investment and venture capital project private equity investment docking platform, is the Chinese version of Angel List, equity investment and financing version of Kickstarter.

"Everyone voted" on the official website to introduce its business model: Suppose there is an entrepreneur who casts his own business project on the website you need to raise one million yuan to buy 20% of the shares. Then there are certain thresholds and qualifications of the top investors voted 50,000 yuan, and the remaining one after another with the input of five voted 200,000, 100,000, 30,000, 500,000 and 120,000 yuan.

After the loan amount has been levied, the lead investor will use this as a registered capital to form a limited partnership and handle the formalities such as the signing of an investment agreement and the change of business administration. After the capital is injected into the entrepreneur's enterprise, the angel financing of the project is completed and the investor In accordance with the proportion of their respective shareholding venture capital companies to sell 20% of the shares.

We cast the founder Liqun Lin once told the "First Financial Daily" reporter, throughout the process, the lead investors responsible for the project due diligence, project inspection, investment management, project analysis and so on. In addition, it is also necessary to supervise the operation of both funds in accordance with the rules set by themselves, and the investors do not have to assume the corresponding responsibilities after the risks occur.

In the recent version of the 2.0 version that we voted to release, we can see the trend of standardization of the equity crowdfunding platform. The rules clarify and standardize the detailed rules involved in the six aspects of project audit, project recognition, implementation of investment, investor payment, post-investment management and service, investor exit and compensation.

The third camp is backed by large groups of "original meeting" platform, "the original will" position itself as a venture capital fund, one-stop equity crowdfunding platform. It is understood that "Primitive Meeting" is the equity crowdfunding platform under NetEase's financial services and provides related services such as docking of resources, publicity and reporting, visual valuation, financial forecasting and financing guidance.

The original person in charge Tao Ye said that the three major platforms for equity crowdfunding should be to break the channel restrictions, reduce the time and cost, make up for lack of expertise and reduce information asymmetry. Tao Ye also believes that the future backbone of equity crowdfunding are those with high net worth and the middle class.

After the investment management, the original design is to let the successful investment company to disclose the enterprise's financial data on a regular basis; to evaluate the credit of the investors and the team; In addition, the original will also cooperate with the Tianjiao and other agencies for investors Provide exit service. Through the original platform financing, equity can be transferred on the platform.

The fourth largest camp is the emerging platform represented by ginkgo fruit, positioning area, subdivision, professional fields. Its main investment projects for the angel, the project invested by its docking Science Park Incubator, breadth through the network platform recommended, entrepreneurial competitions, road shows and other forums combined with investors. CEO of Ginkgo fruit angel crowdfunding platform Zhu Jiajia disclosed to the reporter of "First Financial Daily": "Next, we will make further innovations. Since the beginning of a project can not control risks because the development period is too early, the significance of crowdfunding It is to help start-ups get financing and follow-up services. "