Belgium’s largest investment crowdfunding platform MyMicroInvest easily cruised past its € 1 million in under one hour during a self-crowdfunding event that took place in Brussels today. While Crowdfund Insider is still awaiting the final tally, the one million euro hurdle was topped in about 20 minutes. At the 48 minute mark the total stood at over €1.6 million with approximately 200 investors joining in to support the innovative funding portal. At one point in time it was mentioned that over 1400 viewers were watching the live-streamed event.
Montant record de 1,632 mios EUR levés par @mymicroinvest pendant un Live #Crowdfunding. Objectif #1Million1Hour atteint après 17 minutes.
— Sébastien Buron (@BastianoBuron) January 20, 2016
The event, taking place in the offices of MyMicroInvest, is part of a push to expand the platform into other European countries. MyMicroInvest has already raised €3 million for the expansion so the live-crowdfunding event today gave the opportunity to other, smaller investors to join in the company’s growth. MyMicroInvest has grown rapidly and has raised over €14 million for more than 43 different companies. Similar to other prominent investment crowdfunding platforms, MyMicroInvest engages professional investors / VCs to join in the funding. Smaller investors benefit by receiving the exact same rights as larger investors. In fact, if the anchor investor(s) plan an exit, currently the shareholder agreement demands equal treatment for all shareholders.
We did it and more to come apparently! Yessss! #crowdfunding @mymicroinvest #1million1hour pic.twitter.com/1MYrwgSvwp — Chabert de Radzitzky (@chabertderad) January 20, 2016
During the live-streamed event, the José Zurstrassen, Chairman of MyMicroInvest, alluded to the potential for a secondary trading platform to be launched in the coming months. MyMicroInvest wants to provide an effective vehicle to facilitate exits from early shareholders while recognizing the fact that investing in early stage companies is a long term commitment. Zurstrassen told Crowdfund Insider;
“We feel confident about our further expansion into Europe, and we firmly believe our unique approach to crowdfunding – making use of our co-investment principle – gives us a strategic advantage. This huge support from the crowd confirms once more what we have known longer, which is that we are ready to go European. “
Zeno Bonduelle, who assisted in the event coordination explained the live-crowdfunding took meticulous preparation from the entire team. But even with the advance work they could not have anticipated the overwhelming success.
“The atmosphere in the room last night was electric, and when the counter approached the million mark you could hear people in the room starting to shuffle in their seats. When the mark was reached – after about 17 minutes and in the middle of José Zurstrassen’s pitch – a roar of applause emerged from the audience. Online, via livestream, thousands of people were following and on twitter #1Million1Hour reached no.1 trending topic in Belgium for a few hours.”
If you would like to view the entire proceedings the recorded event is available here now.