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April 04, 2007
The UK's PointOV Mulls Direct Public Offering
Every once in a while in Europe, you see startups trying the direct public offering route to raising capital. The latest is a British eCommerce and new media firm called PointOV, which is specialized in "fair trade" and eco products, according to icNewcastle.co.uk.
.. the Newcastle firm, which has just received £800,000 worth of venture capital to fulfil its short-term growth goals, says it may look to its customers for financial backing next time.PointOV was set up by former Traidcraft and Cafe Direct director Andy Redfern and e-commerce entrepreneur Vic Morgan in 2004 and sells familiar fair trade staples such as tea, coffee and chocolate as well more unusual eco-gadgets such as solar powered iPod chargers and eco-kettles.
Joint managing director Mr Redfern said: "Cafe Direct did it and sold shares to its customers by putting little adverts on the packaging, and managed to raise £5m from its customers.
It's an interesting concept that we've seen here in Switzerland several times, however so far it hasn't led to any ventures that actually grew into big success stories on back of that kind of capital. Then again, the startups we're thinking of didn't have experienced entrepreneurs managing the companies, which is something this one seems to have.
Read. Firm may go public for funding (icnewcastle)
Posted on April 4, 2007 11:08 AM | Posted to News And Updates | Permalink
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