Just a day after the launch of easyProperty, a senior venture capitalist has hit out at its founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou, calling him a celebrity business leader' using crowd-funding websites to exploit small-time investors.
Jon Moulton - an outspoken private equity guru who once tried unsuccessfully to buy MG Rover from BMW and who is now best known as the founder of Better Capital - says so-called retail investors are drawn to crowd-funding sites by personalities.
Celebrity types have spotted this and, as is normal in markets, are testing the limits of exploitation says Moulton.
Sir Stelios has offered 1.5 per cent ownership in the new company for a substantial £1m. He's valuing it at £67m which you must assume he thinks is a great deal for him as he clearly does not need the money.
Moulton claims that private equity investors buying shares at such an early stage in a new company's life might expect a larger holding for £1m.
easyProperty has just used crowd-funding platform Crowdcube to raise £1m and hit its target yesterday, almost a week ahead of schedule. There were around 200 investors with the largest single investment being £200,000.
easyProperty's online lettings service was launched last night at a glittering ceremony in London's Natural History Museum with much talk of nearby dinosaurs representing those in the property industry who still advocate old-school high street branches.
Comments
All Stellios has done is license a brand name. He isn't a director or shareholder. Use of his name is misleading - Its also surprising Mr Moulton has made such a basic error.
For the full list of Easy brands - many never heard of - [url="http://easy.com/brand.html"]see here[/url]
thanks James :) the brand owner is easy Group and they take protection of their trademark very seriously and will no doubt take action where they believe their trademark is being infringed.
http://easy.com/brand-thieves.html
@algarveinvestor absolutely the hard work as you stated started about 2 years ago now comes the heavy lifting. We don't underestimate the challenges we face nor do we shirk from them. We have a great team and some amazing partners behind this, no business is guaranteed success but we have the building blocks in place to give it a real chance of success.
So will they be looking to close down firms who already use the Easy name such as Easy Lettings Or will they not bother - will be interesting to see no doubt.
Is "Easy" a valid copyright
Good luck to all involved - is a good test of web v high street
Well, that didn't last long. The knives are already out.
I've always said it will be interesting to see what easyProperty can do. Will they be a breath of fresh air to the market or will they quickly realise that making it big in property is worlds away from making it big in the airline industry I'm still not sure.
Either way, now the glitz and glamour of the unveiling is over, the real hard work begins. They really have to make a success of it, otherwise the damage to the 'Easy' brand could be severe and Stelios and chums will have to withdraw with their tails between their legs. It'll be fascinating to watch. Still no idea which way it'll go.
@graham the honeymoon is not over we have only just begun, we achieved 1m in crowd funding in record time with requests still pouring in,we have significant investment from very sophisticated investors who have bought into our vision. The feedback from our launch event has been in extremely positive from investors,partners and more importantly landlords.
thanks @number cruncher we are aware of an error regarding vat the good news for tenants is that they always pay the vat inclusive price. We are in the process of rectifying the issue which is technical and doesn't require a manual change.
I see they have 145 properties listed on Rightmove already.... And they all have the same pricing error in the text compared to what's stated on their website. I won't tell them what it is here, but will just smile thinking of the person who's got to go through all 145 and change it :)