April 27

All about crowdfunding and other trends of the digital financing!

The PODIM 2015 Conference will offer you an excellent opportunity to learn about the trends of the digital financial ecosystem and crowdfunding as well as to listen to success stories and get sound guidelines for realizing your ambitious creative or business idea with help of crowdfunding.
 

At the beginning, banks were in the forefront

At the beginning, banks were in the forefront for financing business projects, followed by venture capital investors, but today entrepreneurs have an incredible possibility and opportunity to realize their ambitious business idea through crowdfunding. Crowdfunding offers so much more than just access to capital, since a crowdfunding campaign also allows you to verify the market, establish contact with your target customers and get feedback for further development and additional features. Crowdfunding is truly revolutionary for everyone with an innovative idea.
 

Excellent mechanism for marketing

Crowdfunding is changing the capital market and is an excellent mechanism for marketing, getting product feedback in real time, decreasing risk with product launch and helping to validate the business idea. However, it also hides quite a lot of traps and rules you have to know and consider in order to successfully launch a crowdfunding campaign.
 

Four motivational talks with advice and guidelines

On Thursday, 14 May from 15:30 to 17:00, the PODIM 2015 Conference will host four motivational and incredibly interesting talks on the topic of crowdfunding with four amazing speakers from Europe and the US. You will have the opportunity to listen to the following exceptional experts:

• Ula Hudina Kmetič, deputy head of the European Commission, will present the Crowdfunding guide of the European Commission, and other mechanisms that the European Commission uses to support crowdfunding.
• Carlos Silva is cofounder, president and COO of Seedrs – the world’s leading equity crowdfunding platform – and cofounder of Beta-i, a non-profit association that promotes innovation and entrepreneurship in the Portuguese society. Carlos will mostly talk about general trends from the field of crowdfunding, and new opportunities for everyone with creative and innovative ideas.
• Jouko Ahvenainen is a serial entrepreneur, cofounder of Grow VC Group and a pioneer in digital finance solutions, including crowd investing and p2p lending. He participated in changing US finance regulation, getting the Senate and the President to allow crowdfunding. Jouko will mostly talk about the new digital financial ecosystem and how it can help you realize your business idea. Are you interested in what will happen in the field of finances and financial systems in the future? 
• Niko Klanšek founded FlyKly and introduced the first line of FlyKly electric bicycles to the US market in 2011. In 2013, FlyKly launched one of the most successful Kickstarter campaigns. Today, FlyKly Smart Wheel and Smart Light are riding the streets in more than fifty countries. Niko Klanšek will tell his success story and reveal the secrets of launching a successful crowdfunding campaign.

Do you have an idea you’d like to launch with a crowdfunding campaign? Join us at the PODIM 2015 Conference. 
   

On crowdfunding and the digital financial ecosystem, supported by the European Commission

The four talks on the topic of crowdfunding and digital financial ecosystems at the PODIM 2015 Conference were made possible by the European Commission, which we are proudly collaborating with.
 
The European Commission represents the interests of the EU as a whole. It proposes new legislation and ensures that EU law is correctly applied by the member countries. The European Commission is also supporting entrepreneurship, SMEs and start-ups and their business environment with policy initiatives (e.g. Entrepreneurship Action Plan, Start-up Europe initiative, Accelerator Assembly etc.) as well as financial instruments (e.g. equity and debt financial instruments in COSME and Horizon 2020, Structural Funds and also new Investment Plan and its Fund EFSI).

Read more about the European Commission at http://ec.europa.eu/! The PODIM 2015 Conference will also give you the opportunity to meet and talk with European Commission representatives.