Second Equity Crowdfunding Portal Goes Live In Minnesota

Silicon Prairie Online became the state’s second equity crowdfunding platform late last week, following approval by the Minnesota Department of Commerce.
 
The portal is differentiating itself by offering blockchain technology that offers several benefits to companies, said David Duccini, founder and CEO of the portal. Among those are allowing the system to be an official communications channel complete with digital signatures to ensure information received in trusted, put issues to a direct shareholder vote without using a proxy system and provide a peer-to-peer model of liquidity for small issues of equity.
 
This process also streamlines secondary sales, protects investor information and helps hold a legal title to a given security, according to Zach Robins, a lawyer at Winthrop & Weinstine and cofounder of the equity crowdfunding booster organization MNvest.
 
Equity crowdfunding—the ability to issue equity online to raise money from non-accredited investors—became legal in Minnesota this summer. Despite that, no portals for entrepreneurs seeking capital were actually approved until November, when VentureNear launched.
 
Campaigns have yet to launch on either of the portals.