Indiegogo CEO Slava Rubin has been making the PR rounds of late. Coming off a high visibility funding round where Sir Richard Branson indicated his commitment to the company’s future, Slava shares his view of crowdfunding and market validation talking about an early campaign, Breathometer, that went on to hit the shark tank and quickly raised additional funding.
A growing number of VCs / early stage investors see a rewards based crowdfunding round as a stepping stone to investors further funding startups. This is especially the case for hardware products.
Slava talks about the follow on funding that Misfit Shine captured after raising over $800,000 on Indiegogo back in late 2012.
He also mentions they are not looking for more money right now – they are looking for operational experience – something they clearly drummed up in their most recent funding round. Slava comments once again on the potential of retail equity crowdfunding as clearly they are positioning their platform to enter the space.