Malaysia’s equity crowdfunding scene is becoming increasingly vibrant, during the pitchIN Equity Crowdfunding Report 2017 event, the crowdfunding platform announced that they ended 2017 with 60% market share closing at a total of RM 14,022,132 with 12 issuers.
Sam Shafie, CEO, pitchIN, shared that “Our success was only possible because of the support we received from great companies and we are happy that we were able to find companies that investors loved. We want to take this opportunity to thanks our partners, companies and investors who have made us the number one platform in Malaysia”
Commenting on 2018 plans for pitchIN, Kashminder, CIO and Co-Founder, laid out the company’s plan which includes partnerships with key organisations like The National ICT Association of Malaysia (PIKOM) and outreach to younger investors through the Young Investor Club which is aimed at bringing investment education to youth as well as opportunities to invest through exclusive deals that are only available to club members.
Sam added that for 2018 the key priority for pitchIN will be to onboard a higher number of promising companies to raise funds in pitchIN to create value for its investors. pitchIN will be beginning the year with a decent headstart of having 20 companies already signed up to raised funds between now and June. The list includes prominent entrepreuners like Ganesh Kumar, who’s previous accolades include founding the NASDAQ listed company MOLAcess Berhad who will be raising funds for his new venture Commerce.Asia.
The crowdfunding platform is confident by June 2018 they will be able to comfortably achieve the target of raising between RM 15 Million to 25 Million, surpassing the 2017 target. While the numbers are certainly encouraging investors should also be cautious of investment risks, during the early days of crowdfunding in UK many of the companies raising funds through crowdfunding within 1 to 2 years.
Cognizant of this issue Kashminder emphasised that pitchIN focuses only on having great companies on the platform which they work with on various levels, once they hit certain maturity and traction only then will the companies be put on the platform. He also added that their key principle in evaluating these potential companies is to see whether they themselves would invest their own money in the company, to which Kashminder said that without fail every they have put in their own personal money in every company that has raised in their platform.
We’ve also done a piece summarizing the performance of Equity Crowdfunding platforms in Malaysia, if you’re interested the article can be found here.
