The Perspective of crowdfunding "double-edged Sword" from "hundreds of shareholders in a Coffee Shop"

The words of the host

If a person gives thousands of yuan or tens of thousands of yuan, he can become one of the owners of restaurants, teahouses and cafes. The crowdfunding model makes many dedicated people realize their "boss's dream."

If 2014 is the "first year of crowdfunding", then this entrepreneurial model is advancing by leaps and bounds this year. JD.com and Ali have tried the waters to set up equity crowdfunding platforms, and traditional brokerages are also gearing up to get a piece of the pie. Nowadays, crowdfunding is booming in catering, smart hardware, real estate investment and other areas. Internet financial innovation is changing the traditional concept of venture capital, and the emergence of various crowdfunding models has also broadened the channels of mass investment and entrepreneurship.

So is crowdfunding a reliable entrepreneurial model? What risks need to be avoided? This issue of New Horizon focuses on "crowdfunding craze", starts with a case, shows the real scene of the development of crowdfunding in our province, and discusses the prospects and risks of this entrepreneurial model.

Case study

Invest 10,000 yuan to be a small coffee shop owner

"although the investment is not much, but I feel that this project is not bad. Try crowdfunding." On the evening of June 5, Wang Yi attended the shareholders' meeting of a crowdfunding project in a cafe in Nanchang at the Wanda Center in Honggu Beach. At the end of last year, he invested 10,000 yuan to become one of the shareholders of the cafe.

Li Shuai, one of the sponsors of the cafe, told reporters that the project had a total investment of 1 million yuan, and he and several other core members invested 200000 yuan, accounting for 20 percent of the shares. The other 80% of the shares are invested by 80 people, each with an investment of 10,000 yuan or 1% of the shares. After formal business, dividends will be paid in proportion to the shares.

"We launched this crowdfunding project not for money, but for people." Li Shuai told reporters that the positioning of the cafe is to build a docking platform between investors and entrepreneurs, similar to Beijing's garage coffee, to be an incubator for entrepreneurs. Therefore, through crowdfunding to attract a variety of investors to join, can maximize the role of the platform.

Wang Yi frankly said that he also has a company in Nanchang and spends 10,000 yuan to become a shareholder of a cafe. In fact, he doesn't care whether it can make a profit and pay dividends, but takes a fancy to the resources among shareholders. "to gather the resources in this circle to start a business, it may be more profitable than a single cafe."

Current situation

From catering to real estate crowdfunding.

In less than a year, crowdfunding has played tricks in our province, not only in catering, beauty salon, intelligent hardware and other industries, but even in real estate.

A real estate project in Honggutan New area of Nanchang City attracted 43 "wayward tuhao" in our province to join. Wen Xianlai, chairman of Boneng Holdings Group and one of the sponsors of the project, said Boneng has a stake of more than 10% in the project, making it the largest shareholder. Zhengbang Group, Taihao Group, Jimin Trust and other well-known private enterprises in our province also own shares and want to create a new platform for Jiangxi businessmen to develop as the headquarters base of enterprises in Jiangxi Province.

The rise of the crowdfunding model has also heated up all kinds of crowdfunding platforms. "in Jiangxi, I have received more than 30 crowdfunding projects, involving catering, water purifiers, education and training, real estate agents, intelligent bus stops, and so on." Peng Feng, general manager of Jiangxi contact crowdfunding Investment Consulting Co., Ltd., told reporters that most of the participants in Nanchang's current crowdfunding projects are young entrepreneurs, and the scope of crowdfunding projects is getting wider and wider, and the amount of crowdfunding is becoming more and more diversified.

According to reports, crowdfunding is divided into equity, creditor's rights, returns, and public welfare. Many crowdfunding investors prefer to invest in equity crowdfunding, with a small amount of investment. They not only enjoy the joy of investing and starting a business, but also can share out dividends on a pro rata basis. This is also the most important crowdfunding model in Jiangxi market.

Is the competition platform "crowdfunding" reliable to start a business?

Viewpoint 1: if everyone gathers firewood and the flame is high, multiple wins can be achieved.

■ Peng Feng (founder of Jiangxi Touch crowdfunding, the first crowdfunding person in Jiangxi)

In my opinion, the advantage of crowdfunding is that it provides a link and display platform for small and medium-sized enterprises, investors, ordinary individuals and products.

Crowdfunding is to raise people, money, wisdom and resources, which is most suitable for grass-roots entrepreneurs. It can help entrepreneurs with projects but no funds to recruit "allies" and start projects.

Each crowdfunding project mainly involves the interests of both the project side and the investor: for the project side, it reduces the financial pressure, puts the project on the market in advance through crowdfunding, and grabs the market ahead of time. attracted a group of loyal "fans". For investors, they are interested in the project from purchase to investment. As a shareholder, he or she can not only enjoy early purchase and group purchase services to reduce consumer costs, but also bring a certain amount of return on this investment.

Crowdfunding is also a good advertising platform. Whether the financing is successful or not, your project has been demonstrated to potential investors and provides room for the next round of financing.

As an old saying goes, "everyone gathers firewood and the flame is high." Crowdfunding can not only solve the financial problem, but also allow investors to share the risk.

"crowdfunding" entrepreneurship is not only reliable, but also the direction of future development. I personally predict that crowdfunding will change all formats, projects that do not participate in crowdfunding are easy to be eliminated by the market, and projects that get crowdfunding will grow in a virtuous circle.

Viewpoint 2: promote entrepreneurship and guard against financial risks at the same time

■ Wu Zhijun (Dean of Jiangxi Institute of Economic Development and Reform, Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics)

Crowdfunding is of great help to technology start-ups, realizing the seamless connection between entrepreneurs and investors. However, behind the rapid development of crowdfunding, there are also some problems, such as touching legal risks, lack of professionalism, non-standard information disclosure, lack of credit information system and so on. For example, if the number of shareholders is too large and unprofessional, it is difficult to resolve internal interest disputes after growth; how to protect the legitimate rights and interests of all parties involved, how to prevent crowdfunding from evolving into illegal fund-raising, how to avoid capital fraud and so on.

In crowdfunding, projects often reduce the amount of participation to a level acceptable to individual ordinary investors, but the reduction only lowers the threshold of entry, not the risk of the project.

In addition, most people overlook another risk: early projects often require multiple investments in one area to pay off. For most domestic angel investors, it is good that one or two of the ten projects will last until the next round. If you think an investment of 50, 000 yuan is nothing, think about whether 500000 yuan can afford it. If you can only afford one investment, then profit is an event with a low probability, and it is not surprising to lose money.

At the same time, as crowdfunding has just started in our country, and the relevant laws and regulations are not perfect, in crowdfunding activities, we should also guard against the possibility that fund-raisers may raise funds illegally and defraud investors with the help of crowdfunding activities. sometimes there are even fraudulent acts of crowdfunding platforms helping or concealing fund-raisers. Therefore, in the current situation of imperfect legal supervision, investors should choose carefully and avoid investment risks as far as possible.

The voice can't get around the problem of risk.

It is hoped that the regulators will further clarify the legislation.

Ma Zhihui, director of the Institute of Economics of the Provincial Academy of Social Sciences, said that crowdfunding is an important means of financing to promote entrepreneurship and innovation in the Internet era, and is of great significance for the development of small and micro finance and the construction of multi-level capital markets. Crowdfunding is to publicize angel investment in order to achieve public support for entrepreneurship and innovation, then we will face an unavoidable problem-- how to turn a high-risk business that requires a high degree of professionalism into a low-threshold public undertaking that the public can participate in.

In the future, it is hoped that the regulators can further clarify the legislation so as to provide the rule of law and institutional protection for the development of crowdfunding. Effective government supervision can reduce information asymmetry, curb moral hazard and adverse selection to a certain extent, eliminate the uncertainty at the regulatory level and enhance the confidence of participants. The crowdfunding industry is still in the exploratory stage, and new ideas and modes of operation can be innovated. We can draw lessons from foreign practices in fund trusteeship and information verification, draw a clear bottom line of supervision, and explore a regulatory system that takes into account both financing efficiency and investor protection.

The crowdfunding model is a double-edged sword.

Peng Feng believes that for entrepreneurs, the crowdfunding model will be a "double-edged sword", so that the club will be invincible. Because crowdfunding will make the entrepreneur's business model public, every loophole in the business model will be exposed, and you have to be prepared to deal with it. In addition, a good business model will bring a lot of imitators, have enough confidence and ability to tell people why it is you and not others. Crowdfunding successful projects require complete financial transparency and some effort to deal with these shareholders.

"as an investor, crowdfunding is a kind of equity investment. If you want to treat your investment behavior rationally, you must have the intention of investment failure. If you are gambler-minded investors, you must not play crowdfunding, because these projects are likely to fail, which means that all investments have gone down the drain. " Peng Feng suggested that what is more important than selecting a project is to select a person and choose an entrepreneur. The integrity and character of the entrepreneur are directly related to the future of the project.

Editor of Jiangnan Metropolis Daily / Chen Wenxiu