With an explosion of consumer electronics, food trucks and art projects financed by crowds of individuals online, crowdfunding is in a boom. Startup Crowdtilt wants to make crowdfunding popular for everyday activities -- such as group-funded parties, trips or gifts -- and plans to take the business worldwide.
"It's typically really hard for a group to pool resources. It will resonate with people for smaller bite-sized campaigns," says Crowdtilt CEO and co-founder James Beshara.
The Startup, based here, today announced a $23 million second round of funding led by Andreessen Horowitz that includes SV Angel, Sean Parker and Silicon Valley Bank. Crowdtilt plans to use the investment to hire employees and stake out its international expansion.
"You've got a company capable of rapidly building a team in a bunch of broad use cases. "To fund virtually anything -- we think the sky's the limit." says Andreessen Horowitz partner Jeff Jordan, former CEO at OpenTable.
More than 100,000 people have pooled funds on Crowdtilt since its launch in 2012, according to the company.
Crowdfunding comes in many flavors. While there's a staggering number of platforms funding everything from people in need to products, the one that's grabbed the spotlight is AngelList and others like it. That's because provisions of the JOBS Act may soon allow non-accredited investors to make investments in startups.
"It is going to happen," says Josh Lerner, professor of investment banking at Harvard Business School. "A revolution is really already happening, but it's happening with a group of sophisticated investors."
Crowdfunding as an industry is expected to draw in more than $5 billion in funds this year, according to researcher Massolution, up from $2.7 billion in 2012.
Whether Crowdtilt can grow as a popular means to share costs on road trips, pool funds for tickets to concerts or split up dinner among f! riends remains to be seen.
"The early adopters it will certainly get. Getting to 10 million users is much, much harder," says Rocky Agrawal, analsyt at reDesign mobile, who points out Crowdtilt's 5% fee is steep.
Crowdtilt charges 5% for fundraising campaigns, including a credit card fee per user. The company does not disclose its revenue or whether it is profitable.
"The breath of use cases is only limited by the imagination of the community," says Jordan.
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