Australia’s equity crowdfunding platform VentureCrowd, announced on Wednesday it has closed its first Israeli funding round and secured $155,000 for AI email firm Knowmail. According to the funding portal, the $155,000 was raised in convertible notes, as part of a larger $3 million funding round, which was led by venture capital firms CE Ventures, AfterDox, Plus Ventures and 2B Angels.
Knowmail, which is described as a sophisticated and holistic system that is meant to free employees from tiring and useless communications, was founded in 2014 by Haim Senior, Oded Avital, and Avi Mandelberg. The company’s story revealed that Oded and Haim teamed up to battle the message flooding of unproductive and irrelevant messages in their emails. Together, they made up a way to apply a personalized filter that would allow only relevant and important messages to go through. They eventually brought on Avi and built a team of programmers to create Knowmail.
Speaking about Israel’s startups, interim CEO of VentureCrowd, Luke Fay, stated:
“Israel is a booming hub for startups — in 2015 alone, there was more than US$3.6 billion in funding for startups and more than 100 startup exits valued at over $9 billion. Yet Australian investors have had little opportunity to invest in these startups as access has been difficult for all but ultra-high net worth individuals and institutions. By partnering with Kentgrove Capital and gaining a presence on the ground in Israel, VentureCrowd has opened the door for Australian sophisticated investors to get access to deal flow alongside some of the world’s best angel investors and venture capital firms. We expect to bring several more Israeli startup opportunities to VentureCrowd investors in the coming months, alongside the growing portfolio of startup, property and credit deals we have on the platform.”
Meanwhile, VentureCrowd recently launched its first technology infrastructure investment opportunity this week with a crowdfunding campaign for broadband satellite company Kacific. The company is looking to raise $20 million during its Series A funding round to deliver high-speed internet services to 140 million people in the Pacific Islands, New Zealand, Eastern Indonesia, the Philippines, and Papua New Guinea.
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