Microcosm - 2nd Seedrs crowd-funding round

Yes.

Original investors should all have had an email already outlining the intent to raise more investment in the form of an update every month or two.

If you are an original investor and have not received any emails from investors@ microcosm.cc then email me (or PM) the email address that you would like to have added to that list.

Is that the one that went out on June 11th with the good, the bad and the ugly? I just want to make sure I don't miss the second round.

You can only take up allocation but cannot increase.

Which tells us that investors will need to be told exactly how much they can spend to avoid dilution - i.e. what is the most they can invest before it goes public.

crap... i missed the meet and greet on the 12th...

Signed up to seedrs with my jar of pennies at the ready.

good question then..

If we invested £500, can we invest another £500 or is it by percentage to maintain the overall 'value' of the shares?

Will it simply be

1st time invest £500 of the £50,000 therfore we can take up £1,000 of the £100,000? (2 for 1)
or can we only invest
£500 of the £50,000 therfore we can take up £25 to maintain the 100%? (5% of original)

crap... i missed the meet and hug on the 12th...

Fixed.

Is that the one that went out on June 11th with the good, the bad and the ugly? I just want to make sure I don't miss the second round.

Yes,

good question then..

If we invested £500, can we invest another £500 or is it by percentage to maintain the overall 'value' of the shares?

Will it simply be

1st time invest £500 of the £50,000 therfore we can take up £1,000 of the £100,000? (2 for 1)
or can we only invest
£500 of the £50,000 therfore we can take up £25 to maintain the 100%? (5% of original)

Yes.

But you'd do it in two parts.

Part 1 - In the 10 days before it goes public you'd exercise your pre-emption rights to preserve your %.

Part 2 - When it goes public you'd put the rest in.

Do those pre-emption rights expand through other, future rounds too (at the percentage that you hold pre-round start)?

<Has been playing with a spreadsheet, always dangerous...

I missed out and was gutted. I have a seedrs account now all set up though and would love to be involved this time round.

crap... i missed the meet and greet on the 12th...

Think they have one every month, there was some mention about the next one being out west.

But is this Microcosm going to be there.
I would like to meet this VelloCEO and 6Pint and the rest...

Do those pre-emption rights expand through other, future rounds too (at the percentage that you hold pre-round start)?

<Has been playing with a spreadsheet, always dangerous...

Yes.

And we need 2 community managers... 1 immediately in a more senior role focused on marketing and providing support to existing communities and helping to grow those, and then a more junior role to perform the support role to communities.

In. How many stock options do I get?

Ok, I want to keep my share undiluted so will wait further instructions.

VB, will we hear direct from seedrs or from you when we need to add additional funds?

Both. Seedrs will inform you, but to be honest whilst they have improved dramatically in their communications in the last 6 months, I will still be sending an email to the investors@microcosm.cc list, which is the list of emails extracted from the information I received when you invested.

If the email needs updating, and you didn't receive my email a week or two ago with the good, bad and ugly... then let me know what email you want to use and I'll get it sorted.

If we have only a very short window to invest in the next round can I ask that we get plenty of notice as to exactly when that will be? I really don't want to be away from my PC for a day or two only to get an email saying that it's opening in an hour or two.

In a week or two time, it will open for previous investors. Who will then have 10 working days to choose to take up their right to preserve their positions.

Which means in 3-4 weeks time, we'll launch the public part.

Actual date to be determined, and I will have the go-live button... so I will do my best to spread word of the go-live time in advance (via this thread, and email).

Both. Seedrs will inform you, but to be honest whilst they have improved dramatically in their communications in the last 6 months, I will still be sending an email to the investors@microcosm.cc list, which is the list of emails extracted from the information I received when you invested.

If the email needs updating, and you didn't receive my email a week or two ago with the good, bad and ugly... then let me know what email you want to use and I'll get it sorted.

Got that email so I'm all set.

Well done again, this is impressive stuff.

Last question re dilution and valuation.

If you are diluting now and issuing new shares against a valuation of £2m (which seems fair BTW) how will you raise a further £400k in the next round? Will it be an increased valuation again?

I think they are all being lumped together in a single round, but only 100K is being released at first as thats the limit of SEIS, and then the other 400K afterwards with EIS

We're not exactly sure how the £400k part will be done yet.

We're investigating the options available.

It may not make sense to do the £400k via Seedrs given the 7.5% fees. Plus, depending on who invests the EIS eligibility may not be required in any way (in which case we could just go ahead straight away).

It's effectively one round, split into two parts, with £100k open to crowd-funding, and the £400k only available to angels and early-stage institution investors. The form of the £400k is totally open right now, it may be as a convertible note, it may only be to a few high-net worth individuals, it may be a couple of institutions, it may be a mix of all of the above.

And it may increase in value again, it may well be that the crowd-funding of the £100k is social proof enough to justify it. The £2m valuation (which we haven't confirmed yet) is currently being accepted by investors as a bargain... i.e. the valuation is too low. So it may be that we go somewhere in that ballpark for Seedrs, but then increase the valuation for the £400k part of the round and treat it as a follow-on at a different valuation.

There are a lot of open questions about the £400k part, and none of those questions we're rushing to answer. We're basically listening and adapting our path depending on that feedback.

Thanks for the answers.

Now, get back to coding.

We've barely been coding this past three or four weeks.

We were trying to juggle everything, coding, sales (new customers), developer interest, marketing, funding... it gets to the point that everything is in the air and you're barely able to make progress with anything.

We changed direction this last week, we basically evaluated our progress and realised we need to focus on one thing at a time to really make substantial progress. And that we can't let multiple things creep up on us like that.

Hence, we need to focus on the fund-raising, and once done focus on the hiring, and once done, split the team to focus on the coding and the sales, etc.

Context switching is expensive. People can do it once or twice a day, but not 10 times a day... you just get nothing done.

I'm basically coding in the evenings now, so that I can do the business stuff during the day.

This will stop being so much of an issue when there are more of us and we can delegate, then progress will be constantly made even when we're working on other things.

... it gets to the point that everything is in the air and you're barely able to make progress with anything...
...
Context switching is expensive. People can do it once or twice a day, but not 10 times a day... you just get nothing done....

Too true. Kanban throughput limits for the win.