Crowdcube‘s Emilien Hoet has recently written a blog post on the company’s hub focusing on the latest trends in the industry over the first half of 2017. Something worth mentioning has been happening with Corporate Venturing.
Corporate venture capital (CVC) or corporate venturing is the investment of corporate funds directly in external startup companies.(Wikipedia)
If on the one hand FinTech and BioTech confirmed to be hot topics within the equity crowdfunding realm, on the other great food for thought comes from Corporate Venturing:
What’s worth noting here is the increased prevalence of corporate venturing investing alongside the crowd – Elior PLC, a publicly listed global catering player, led Vita Mojo’s round with a £1m check. This follows the success of Aviva Ventures, who backed home security camera firm, Cocoon (£2.4m) and hardware company, PiptPat, hailed as a ‘fitbit’ for dogs. As a result of their campaign they attracted investment from RSA, the insurance giant, and Neovia, a €1.6bn turnover global player in nutrition, animal health and pet food.
The Senior Equity Fundraising Manager at Crowdcube added:
The association between corporate venturing and crowdfunding makes a lot of sense. On one hand, the crowd validates the consumer proposition for these behemoths that may fail to appreciate true customer demand. On the other, the corporate backing validates the valuation, market potential and viability for non-sector specific crowd investors.
Find out more here.
Oliver* 