Sure, you can find plenty of big-name companies that bootstrapped their way to success without any outside investment — Calendly, GoPro, MailChimp and SPANX come to mind.
Historically though, the majority of early-stage startups eventually have to move out of their bootstrapping stage to tap into outside sources of capital from institutional investors. But, beyond the classic Series A and B from your local VC, founders have myriad alternative funding routes they can take — like crowdfunding — to raise the money they need to grow.
A new SEC regulation significantly increased the pool of money available through regulated equity crowdfunding from $1.07 million in any twelve-month period to $5 million.
That’s a five-fold increase, and certainly a tempting reason to consider crowdfunding for your startup. It’s why we’ve invited Sahil Lavingia — the founder and CEO of Gumroad — and Slava Rubin — founder of both humbition and Vincent and a co-founder of Indiegogo — to share their extensive knowledge and experience in the session, When it Makes Sense to Crowdfund Capital at TechCrunch Early Stage on April 14.
Together, they’ll talk about when it makes sense to crowdsource capital, delve into the SEC regulations, explain what they mean and discuss the different options available for founders. There has never been more capital up for grabs, and there have never been so many ways to go about acquiring money to start a business. Once you identify the best funding route for your company, how do you navigate that path successfully?
Sahil Lavingia was Pinterest employee No. 2; he left (before vesting) to found Gumroad, an e-commerce platform where creatives sell their digital products directly to customers. Lavingia offers an honest assessment of his Gumroad journey in his essay, Reflecting on My Failure to Build a Billion-Dollar Company, and is the author of the book, “The Minimalist Entrepreneur: How Great Founders Do More with Less.”
In 2020, the self-described “VC-hating VC,” Lavingia founded SHL Capital, which invests more than $15 million a year in early-stage startups, mostly in amounts ranging from $100,000-$250,000. Investments include Figma, Lambda School (now Bloom Institute of Technology) and HelloSign.
Slava Rubin co-founded Indiegogo in 2006 and, as CEO for more than a decade, led the organization to become one of the world’s largest crowdfunding platforms with more than $1 billion distributed worldwide.
In 2019, Rubin founded Vincent, a platform offering the largest selection of alternative investments, making discovery and due diligence easier for investors and changing how people access them. He is also founder of humbition, a $30 million early-stage venture fund. His angel portfolio includes multiple unicorns, including Hedera, GOAT, Braintrust and Carta.
Rubin represented the crowdfunding industry at the White House during the signing of the JOBS Act under the Obama administration and has helped navigate bringing equity crowdfunding to the American public.
If you’re hunting for funding and curious about crowdfunding, don’t miss this session. Join Sahil Lavingia and Slava Rubin as they discuss when and why crowdfunding makes sense and explain the SEC’s latest regulations expanding the crowdfunding cash pool. They’ll look at the various offerings to consider and talk about what it takes to crowdfund successfully.
TC Early Stage will provide you with plenty of time to engage, ask questions and walk away with a deeper, working understanding of topics and skills that are essential to startup success. Reserve your spot and register today before we run out of $249 tickets and prices increase!