OurCrowd Gets Record Equity Investment

The crowdfunding platform OurCrowd announced today that $72 million has been raised in a Series C round of funding, but the company expects this to increase to $100 million, according to a press release.

The company plans to spend 50 percent on building out its offices worldwide and on platform development, and the remainder will match the investments on OurCrowd. According to CEO Jon Medved: “This new capital will help us hit our goal of investing $1 billion annually by 2020.”

The success of Israel-based OurCrowd is based on its ability to access certain sources of funding for startups more directly. For example, while a family office might back a startup, now, that family office might engage in OurCrowd’s platform. The company has not divulged who all of the backers are, claiming that most have requested confidentiality. But one strategic investor has been named, Singapore bank UOB Group.

“We understand the ambitions of startups and emerging enterprises and want to help them grow into sustainable businesses. We look forward to working closely with OurCrowd to further develop their platform to support the startup ecosystem both in Singapore and the broader Asian market,” said Janet Young, MD of group channels and digitalization at UOB Group.

OurCrowd has raised just over $100 million, including today’s round, and currently has 100 companies in its portfolio, with more than $300 million invested.

According to Geoff Levy, chairman of Monash Private Equity in Sydney, Australia, who is a member of OurCrowd’s advisory board and an investor:

“OurCrowd has grown incredibly fast over the last three-plus years. With this new and important Series C funding, we expect to continue this steep growth trajectory, not only gaining more investors and capital worldwide but, most importantly, increasing the ‘crowds’ involvement in sourcing and adding value to our remarkable portfolio of companies.”