Collaborative or decentralized models of finance and investing, including equity crowdfunding, reward crowdfunding, crowd currencies, peer-to-peer lending and peer-to-peer commerce.
From unknown, to renowned, to unknown again, blockchain technology’s past year has been tumultuous. Optimism abounded at the beginning of 2018. A technological revolution was happening. However, the outcome of that revolution was much more sobering. Today, in the...
Cryptocurrencies are massively disrupting the financial sector. This time last year we witnessed something amazing for the first time in history: people became aware of cryptocurrencies at large and started actively buying them, resulting in massive price jumps in...
It is very reassuring to small-stake equity crowdfunding investors to believe that the terms of their deals are the same terms as those offered to large investors, with no discrimination against ‘the small guys’. However, the latest round of ‘in-house’ fundraising by...
The banking industry has always been perceived as a bedrock of economic stability, but it is experiencing disruption at an increasing pace. A sea change in finance is being driven by technology, which is both expanding service capabilities and reshaping client...
The World Economic Forum is the international, independent organisation behind the celebrated annual Davos event in Switzerland that under the attention of global media draws together 2,500 “business, political, academic, and other leaders of society to shape global,...
Venture capital is growing enormously as a potential for exponential returns on investment. According to PitchBook, 2018 is on track to surpass $100 billion in deal value, an enormous achievement. Equity crowdfunding is a venture capital model disrupting the...
The Bitcoin price is ballooning again, but this time we’re all a little hesitant to get excited. After so many price pumps quickly followed by price dumps, it’s hard to know if the price will continue going upward this time. All cryptocurrencies have been as volatile...
The power of crowds, who can link together and organize effectively through smart mobile technology, is disrupting traditional power bases at political, corporate, media and financial levels. The rise of populist political leaders who communicate with their...
California-based Tipalti, founded in 2010 by serial entrepreneur Chen Amit and underground VC Oren Zeev, was created to address the difficulties associated with making mass global payments. It does this through a comprehensive cloud-based solution that automates all...
Blockchain is probably the most remarkable innovation of the modern digital world. It remains one of the most promising technologies with the potential to transform and improve the global economy. Many businesses are keen to adopt Blockchain technology to increase the...
The U.S. Department of Labor recently put out a report on the state of freelancers and gig workers. As one of the largest studies in the space, it showed that the percentage of short-term workers was actually down slightly from 2005 when the Bureau of Labor Statistics...
Blockchain and other distributed ledger technologies provide a revolutionary way of creating, maintaining, and securing decentralized networks. The emergence of these networks has enabled a whole range of decentralized applications; applications that threaten to...
The Mayor of London recently announced his annual allocation of £1 million available to a range of grassroots community projects. Operating in conjunction with UK crowdfunding platform Spacehive, and co-ordinated through the Greater London Authority, community project...
Depending on who you ask, blockchain may be humanity’s greatest Ponzi scheme or the solution to everything from cancer to credit card transaction fees. The reality most certainly lies somewhere in between. When we theorize about the future of disruptive tech, the...
You can’t look in the news today without some Bitcoin enthusiast or some dumbfounded reporter trying to make sense of cryptocurrencies. It’s seemingly replaced Game of Thrones as the subject of every coffee shop conversation, yet very few actually understand the...
If you have an idea for a mobile app, you’re probably excited to get started with it – and you should be. Globally, the mobile app market generates about $60 billion in revenue every year, which means that mobile apps present a huge opportunity for new businesses. But...
The US crowdfunding sector has grown far bigger and wider than the reward projects initially associated with Indiegogo and Kickstarter. Groundfloor is a real estate investment platform that enables everyday Americans to have a fractional involvement in short-term,...
While the tech world has its eyes set on ICOs - the funding frenzy of 2017 - an often overlooked currency seems to be shaping the way forward for tech giants. Trust is the most important currency and shouldn’t be ignored by individuals and organizations. Early in...
“Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising many small amounts of money from a large number of people, typically via the Internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and of alternative finance.” Source: Wikipedia.There are four main...
[INFOGRAPHIC – UPDATED JANUARY 2018] Bitcoin is a virtual currency that uses Blockchain technology for secure payments and storing money electronically, without requiring a bank or a person’s name. Satoshi Nakamoto created this cryptocurrency back in 2009. The biggest...
Your startup is off the ground and the first few months have seen you gain traction in your chosen field; good job, the easy part is done. What comes next will be one of the most daunting, challenging, but ultimately rewarding, experiences you can have. Accessing...
We recently ran articles on the increasing decentralization of sustainable energy production and energy distribution. In August 2017 a new type of disruptive energy supplier launched in the UK. After successfully raising almost £500,000 through reward crowdfunding,...
Crowdfunding in Sweden continues to grow and make headlines, from startups using donations-for-rewards crowdfunding as a sales channel for innovative products to quickly achieve high turnover, to the electric vehicle manufacturer Uniti raising €1.2m through its own...
In Part 1 we looked at decentralization of electricity generation, largely due to the availability of affordable equipment for domestic-scale production from renewable sources. Part 2 looks at the distribution side of the industry, where digitization will enable...