40Billion.com Launches Funding Probability for Small Business Entrepreneurs

June 30, 2011 Leave a Comment

Tool uses algorithm to estimate likelihood that friends and family will invest in a business

40Billion.com, the leading professional social funding platform, has launched a beta version of its Funding Probability tool to help users determine who in their social networks are most likely to provide funding for their business ventures.

It is estimated that over 50% of new businesses generate funds from friends and family of the entrepreneurs. However, for many entrepreneurs, the main challenge that they face is locating the right people who are most willing and able to fund their ventures. Recognizing this common problem, 40Billion.com has created a unique solution called Funding Probability.

As the name suggests, the Funding Probability tool helps users estimate the probability that each person in their social network will become a funder or investor. The tool is based on a proprietary algorithm, which ranks each of the user’s contacts and indicates funding probability with an easy scale of High, Medium, and Low. The “High” probability contacts are those individuals who are most likely to provide funding to a particular business venture, and the “Low” probability contacts are individuals who are least likely to fund it. Based on this scale, the system is able to match the user’s venture with the most promising funding sources in their social networks.

Since launching a prototype of the Funding Probability tool in April, the company has seen promising results as 9 out of 10 actual funders in the entrepreneur’s social network on 40Billion were ranked either High or Medium on the funding probability scale.

The Funding Probability feature saves entrepreneurs time and resources that they often spend chasing unlikely funding sources. Fundraisers can access the tool by clicking Invite Your Friends on their business fundraising profile page, and 40Billion takes much of the guess work out of raising money. Step by step, the online company is working to make social funding easier for U.S. small businesses to raise money than traditional funding methods.

About 40Billion.com

40Billion.com is the social funding network for small businesses and startup entrepreneurs. 40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. In business since 2008, the company aims to address a $40 billion funding gap. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.

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40Billion.com Launches Mobile Website for Small Business Entrepreneurs to Raise Money

June 8, 2011 Leave a Comment

Users build social networks and raise funding for businesses conveniently on web-enabled phones

40Billion.com, the leading professional social funding platform, has launched 40Billion.mobi as the new version of its mobile website. Optimized for smart phones the new site enables rich user experiences and provides new features allowing users to raise money and grow professional social networks more conveniently via 40Billion on the go.

40Billion.mobi is another innovative way to make fundraising more convenient for small business entrepreneurs. Users of the fast-growing site can manage their professional social networks and business fundraising profiles anwhere they are with the convenience of their web-enabled smartphones, including iPhone, Blackberry, and Android phones. 

The development of a new mobile site gives entrepreneurs and investors the convenience they need to build and grow businesses while traveling. Users can choose whether to browse the full 40Billion.com site, or  whether to use the mobile version of the site at 40Billion.mobi. According to Cornelius McNab, founder and chief executive, “There are three times as many cell phone users in the world as there are regular computer Internet users, and cell phone users are adopting web-enabled smartphones at a fast rate. Many business professionals already read their emails from their phones, so now they can read 40Billion’s emails, build their professional social networks of contacts, raise money for their businesses, view and track Raises, and search for resources to help build businesses.”

The company anticipates that the launch of the 40Billion.mobi will lead to massive growth by giving busy professionals the freedom and flexibility to better access and manage business fundraising profiles from anywhere. As an extension of 40Billion.com and another way to access its services online, 40Billion.mobi is designed to further simplify the sometimes daunting process of raising business capital with friends and family.
About 40Billion.com

40Billion.com is the social funding network for small businesses and startup entrepreneurs. 40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. In business since 2008, the company aims to address a $40 billion funding gap. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.

 

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40Billion.com Launches Audio Startup Guides To Help Entrepreneurs Start New Businesses

March 9, 2011 Leave a Comment

Five downloadable guides help entrepreneurs start new businesses quickly with tips for raising money, writing business plans, incorporating, managing cash flow, and protecting ideas.

40Billion.com (http://www.40billion.com), an online micro-funding and social networking platform for entrepreneurs and business professionals, has announced the release of 5 new Startup Guides to aid new business owners. The downloadable audio guides and templates provide quick access to information about raising money, funding options, business plans, company formation, cash flow management, and intellectual property protection.

In these Startup Guides, users can discover useful tips on 5 of the most important topics for new businesses:

On the website, users can download the short audio files and listen to them on any MP3 compatible player, including iPod and other portable music players, personal computers, iPhone and other smart phones, and many cars equipped with MP3 players.

Furthermore, users can download easy-to-use templates that come with each audio guide. For example, the startup guide on how to write a business plan comes with a 13-slide business plan template that users can fill out while listening to the audio instructions.

There is no charge for the first Startup Guide, and additional Startup Guides are $0.99 each. For more information, go to http://www.40billion.com/startupguides or click Startup Guides on the 40Billion.com site.

About 40Billion.com

40Billion.com is the social funding network for small businesses and startup entrepreneurs. 40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. In business since 2008, the company aims to address a $40 billion funding gap. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.

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40Billion.com Small Business Funding to Explode to over $100 Million in 2011

February 28, 2011 1 Comment

40Billion.com continues to grow rapidly by incorporating online social networking to raise money for business ventures. New features have boosted entrepreneurial fundraising activity to over $30 Million, which is expected to triple to $100 Million this year.

40Billion.com, an online micro-funding and social networking platform for entrepreneurs and business professionals, is growing rapidly by incorporating online social networking to help raise money for small businesses and startup ideas. 40Billion.com logoNew fundraising tools and social networking features have boosted entrepreneurial fundraising activity to over $30 Million, which is expected to triple to over $100 Million in 2011.

Many businesses get started with financing from the entrepreneur’s friends and family, but it is often difficult to manage these relationships. 40Billion.com allows many people to donate or lend small amounts of money and spread the risk. Furthermore, the service provides its own unique rating mechanism, called Social Business Rating System (or SBRS), as well as communication tools to increase transparency between the entrepreneur and investors.

To request funding, an entrepreneur uses 40Billion.com to start a fundraising profile, known as a Raise, and invites their friends, family and others in their social network to invest and contribute towards the funding target. 40Billion.com makes it easier for entrepreneurs to share their business ideas with friends and relatives, who may want to invest or otherwise support ventures, and it offers easy ways to formalize and track funding agreements such as direct loans and commercial paper.
 
“We’ve facilitated over $30 Million in Raises, and we’re seeing a huge increase in demand, where more entrepreneurs are using our online micro-funding platform to get business loans and other types of financing because their communities and networks of friends and relatives will believe in them when banks will not,” said Cornelius Colin McNab, founder and chief executive at 40Billion.com. “Tough economic times have led to a credit crunch, where banks have tightened up, and this has increased the funding gap and made things worse for entrepreneurs chasing the American dream. 40Billion offers new and innovative alternatives to gain access to affordable financing through the power of the Internet. Our goal is to help all those hardworking entrepreneurs that have good ideas but don’t have the money or resources to get started.”

40Billion.com predicts that adoption of online crowdfunding, small-business microfinance, and professional social networking services by mainstream users will catapult its growth to over $100 Million in fundraising activity by the end of 2011.

About 40Billion.com

40Billion.com is the social funding network for small businesses and startup entrepreneurs. 40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. In business since 2008, the company aims to address a $40 billion funding gap. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA. For more information, go to http://www.40billion.com on the Web.

 

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40Billion.com Lets Small Businesses Turn LinkedIn And Facebook Social Networks Into Funding Networks

February 13, 2011 Leave a Comment

Online social networking and finance tools help entrepreneurs share business plans, raise money, and launch businesses with friends and contacts

40Billion.com, an online micro-funding and social networking platform for entrepreneurs and business professionals, has announced new integrated social networking tools that enable members to use their existing LinkedIn or Facebook accounts to help raise money for small businesses.

Using the Internet service, visitors connected by existing social networks – such as friends, relatives, co-workers, classmates, and other contacts – can sign up and sign in quickly and easily with their existing LinkedIn or Facebook accounts. The user simply clicks the “Sign in with LinkedIn” or “Sign in with Facebook” button and then enters their email address and password. 40Billion.com instantly logs in and automatically creates the user’s profile, including photo, summary, education, interests, honors, or other relevant information.

“Social networking sites are extremely popular with 90 million users on LinkedIn and 500 million users on Facebook, and many of the people using those sites for professional and personal social networking could use 40Billion also to raise money and grow businesses by leveraging their existing social networks,” said Cornelius McNab, 40Billion’s founder and chief executive.

“That’s why we’ve made it easy to log in on 40Billion with the same email address and password you use on those other sites. Your profile is automatically updated with relevant information about you, and you can invite your contacts from those other sites to join your network on 40Billion. This saves a lot of time and lowers the hurdle for entrepreneurs, investors, and friends who want to help build businesses, realize the American dream, and grow the economy.”

After signing in, each member can add people to their network easily by finding other members they know on 40Billion.com, inviting friends to join, importing their existing contacts from an email program (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo Mail, AOL, or Outlook) or from a social networking site (e.g., LinkedIn or Facebook), and sharing their profile on their LinkedIn or Facebook page. Furthermore, the service automatically suggests new contacts that the member may know.

Members use their profiles and contacts on 40Billion.com to help raise funding for a business, support businesses seeking funding and resources, and acquire new customers.

About 40Billion.com
40Billion.com is the social funding network for small businesses and startup entrepreneurs. 40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. Since 2008, the company has facilitated over $30 million in Raises and aims to address a $40 billion funding gap. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA.

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40Billion.com Creates Social Business Rating System as Alternative to Credit Scores

January 24, 2011 3 Comments

SBRS score offers businesses and investors an alternative to personal credit scores when evaluating funding and loan requests

Atlanta, GA, January 24, 2011 – 40Billion.com, a micro-funding platform that facilitates business capital fundraising through gifts and loans from an entrepreneur’s network of friends and family online, recently announced the launch of the Social Business Rating System, a novel approach to rating businesses based on social and financial criteria other than personal credit scores.

The Social Business Rating System (SBRS), is a proprietary system developed exclusively by 40Billion.com to rate businesses based on criteria that really matter for success, rather than traditional credit scores. A unique SBRS score is generated for each business venture’s fundraising profile, and the score is based on 17 or more criteria, including business-related success measures, entrepreneurial profile, peer ratings, and reviews.

The SBRS score helps investors and entrepreneurs to compare business ventures and assess their potential likelihood of success. The highest possible SBRS score is 850, and scores are updated weekly.

“Banks typically use personal credit scores to determine whether or not to lend money to a small business, and most startup ventures don’t qualify for bank loans. This is very unfair,” says Harendra Jani, Vice President of Finance at 40Billion.com.

“SBRS is an innovative system that differs significantly from FICO, which relies on numerical figures based on personal credit history. SBRS evaluates business success measures and takes social factors into account, so it’s a great alternative or supplement to personal credit history when rating businesses and assessing risk. The SBRS score helps investors assess the credit worthiness of the entrepreneur’s venture, and it provides an incentive for entrepreneurs to improve upon these success criteria in order to increase their scores and potentially raise more funding at more affordable rates.”

The company has generated SBRS scores for thousands of small businesses and facilitated over $30 million in business fundraising projects since 2008. It aims to address a $40 billion gap in small business and startup funding by providing an online platform for social funding so that more entrepreneurs can have access to affordable business financing, realize the American dream, and help grow the economy.

About 40Billion.com
40Billion.com is the first micro-funding platform that facilitates American small business capital fundraising through gifts and loans from an entrepreneur’s network of friends and family online. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA. For more information, visit http://www.40Billion.com.

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40Billion.com Launches Social Network for Student Entrepreneurs and Alumni

January 12, 2011 Leave a Comment

Social networking and finance tools to help college students and alumni share ideas, raise money, and start businesses

Atlanta, GA, January 12, 2011 – 40Billion.com, a micro-funding platform that facilitates business capital fundraising through gifts and loans from an entrepreneur’s network of friends and family online, today announced the launch of new social networking tools for students and alumni to raise money for businesses.

Using the free Internet service, college students and alumni can build their social networks of contacts, including classmates and friends from the same school and from different schools, and use these connections to raise money, resources, and support for entrepreneurial ventures. Members create personal profiles that include their education information, such as school name, degree, major, and graduation year. They can add one or multiple schools to their profiles and then invite people they know from each school to join their network. The service even suggests new contacts, automatically, based on their profiles.

“Many of the most innovative and successful businesses are started by college students and alumni, and now 40Billion.com makes it easier to launch a new venture with the support of your school. Whether you’re a Harvard dropout, a college graduate, an undergraduate, or a business school student, this is for you. If you’re starting a business, you have an idea for a new product, you want to help fund the ventures of entrepreneurs from your school, or you want to build your network, then this is for you. You probably already know someone using it,” said Cornelius McNab, founder of 40Billion.com and graduate of Yale University and MIT Sloan business school.

The company has facilitated over $30 million in business fundraising projects since 2008. It aims to address a $40 billion gap in small business and startup funding by providing an online platform for social funding so that more entrepreneurs can have access to affordable business financing, realize the American dream, and help grow the economy.

About 40Billion.com
40Billion.com is the first micro-funding platform that facilitates American small business capital fundraising through gifts and loans from an entrepreneur’s network of friends and family online. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA. For more information, visit http://www.40Billion.com.

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40billion.com Introduces Commercial Paper Offering

November 29, 2010 Leave a Comment



Additional social network funding option to help entrepreneurs create their own American dream

Nov 29, 2010 – Atlanta, GA, November 29, 2010—40Billion.com (http://www.40billion.com), a micro-funding platform that facilitates business capital fundraising through gifts and loans from an entrepreneur’s network of friends and family online, today announced the addition of an innovative Commercial Paper offering.

Commercial Paper is an unsecured Promissory Note to meet short-term liquidity needs. It is a lower cost alternative to a traditional bank line-of-credit (LOC).  Commercial Paper, which has been in existence for over 100 years, is used commonly by large corporations to raise quick and low cost working capital. 40Billion.com is pleased to be able to offer this reputable financing option to small- and mid-sized businesses seeking to borrow $5,000 to $1,000,000 for up to 270 days.

“We see this as a true ‘win-win’ situation for both investors and borrowers,” said Harendra Jani, vice-president of finance, 40Billion.com.  “If you asked entrepreneurs to name the most difficult obstacle to overcome when launching their business, the most common answer is likely to be access to low cost capital.  Providing a venue to access low cost capital has been 40Billion.com’s mission since day one, and the addition of Commercial Paper speaks directly to that mission.”

40Billion.com aims to address a $40 Billion gap in small business and startup funding by providing an online platform for social funding so that more entrepreneurs can have access to affordable business financing through gifts and loans.

40Billion.com helps entrepreneurs:

  • Gain access to needed funding to start and grow their business, with more funding options, and at rates that are lower and more affordable than most alternatives.
  • Formalize the terms of funding in order to reduce the risk of ruining relationships with friends-and-family funders, while building a network and reputation that they can utilize for future funding needs.
  • Take advantage of unique features that are created specifically for entrepreneurs that need to raise money.
  • Find trusted resources and services for their business, such as incorporation or company formation.
  • Acquire customers by offering services to other members on 40Billion.com.

“One of the many effects of the volatile credit market environment of the past few years is severely decreased access to affordable sources of business credit,” said Cornelius McNab, founder and CEO, 40Billion.com. “No segment has been affected more by this than entrepreneurs trying to live out their own version of the American dream.  Today’s entrepreneurs are tomorrow’s employers.  Providing access to capital for entrepreneurs will undoubtedly lead to job creation in the future, and 40Billion.com is proud to play a role in that process.”

About 40Billion.com
40Billion.com, Inc. is the first Internet-based microfinance company serving American small businesses. 40Billion.com’s scalable platform helps entrepreneurs raise funding more affordably through friends and family than through banks or other traditional financial institutions. Using proprietary online tools, entrepreneurs build social networks – including friends, relatives, colleagues, customers, and other contacts – and use these connections to raise capital through small business loans and gifts. Entrepreneurs create fundraising profiles and invite their connections to offer funding in exchange for discounts or potential returns. 40Billion.com, Inc. is headquartered in Atlanta, GA. For more information, visit http://www.40Billion.com.

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New funding option launched: Commercial Paper short-term business loans for operating expenses

September 20, 2010 Leave a Comment

We’ve launched a new, innovative, and exciting addition to our business fundraising platform… Commercial Paper! Commercial Paper is ideal for existing businesses seeking short-term loans of $5,000 up to $1,000,000 for operating expenses or working capital.

Now, 40billion.com offers 3 alternative ways to raise funding for your small business: gifts & donations, private direct loans, and commercial paper short-term loans. Check it out, and start a Raise at http://www.40billion.com/raise_start.asp now.

Raise business capital from the people you know on 40billion.com

To your success,

-The 40billion Team

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Welcome Brent Wadman, our new VP General Counsel, to the 40billion.com team

August 1, 2010 Leave a Comment

We’d like to welcome Brent Wadman, our new General Counsel, to the team!

Brent is a litigator and corporate attorney with more than 11 years of experience. He volunteers substantial time and effort in the entrepreneur community and has created several businesses of his own. Brent has significant experience counseling corporations in IP licensing, litigation, M&A transactions, SEC compliance, corporate governance and general regulatory compliance. He has recently represented corporations before the SEC, State Attorneys General and foreign regulatory agencies.

In his career, Brent has been Assistant General Counsel of infoGroup, Inc., a publicly-traded, $600 million, marketing solutions provider for businesses; attorney and owner of Wadman Law, a corporate litigation boutique concentrating on corporate formation, commercial transactions, government contracting; and, Attorney at Ameritrade, Inc. a publicly-traded, financial services corporation providing online trading and investing, where he concentrated in NASD/FINRA compliance and maintained series 4, 6, 7, 23, 24 and 63 securities licenses.

Brent holds a BA degree from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and a JD from the University of Tulsa, College of Law.

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Welcome Dan Pugh, our new Chief Operating Officer, to the 40billion.com team

June 1, 2010 Leave a Comment

We’d like to welcome Daniel Pugh, our new COO, to the team!

Dan is a business executive and corporate attorney with more than 16 years of experience leading and advising technology-driven companies and counseling business leaders, entrepreneurs, scientists, and venture capital investors. He particularly enjoys working with startups and early-stage ventures and has assisted these companies in all aspects of business including founding, organization, operations, early funding, venture and mezzanine investments, IPOs, public and private M&A transactions, intellectual property development and licensing, joint ventures, corporate governance, and many other areas. Most recently, Dan served as a strategic and project management consultant to the hedge fund Silver Point Capital, as business and legal consultant to Arbitron Inc. (NYSE:ARB) and Micro Focus (US), Inc., and as strategy and transactions advisor to numerous private companies and entrepreneurs.

In the role of company legal advisor, Dan has been General Counsel of Synthetic Genomics, Inc., a biotechnology startup focusing on synthetic biology and biofuels research and development, Vice President and Deputy Chief Counsel-Corporate of Prism Communication Services, Inc., a broadband telecommunications venture, and Senior Attorney with Arbitron Inc., the media audience and consumer research company. Dan started his career as an Associate in the Corporate Department of the law firm Piper & Marbury L.L.P. (now DLA Piper) representing entrepreneurs and venture capital funds and specializing in venture capital financing, M&A transactions, securities law, and technology licensing. He later was Of Counsel to the firm Davis Wright Tremaine LLP, working with similar clients and transactions.

Dan holds a BS degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), a JD from the University of Maryland School of Law (where he served as Executive Editor of the Maryland Law Review), and an MBA from the University of Maryland’s Smith School of Business.

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40billion.com Launches New Features to Help Small Businesses Find Funding

July 28, 2009 Leave a Comment

Innovative Tools Help Small Businesses Access Loans and Resources by Networking Online

ATLANTA, Georgia – July 28, 2009 – 40billion.com (http://www.40billion.com) launched new features to enable small business entrepreneurs to raise capital and access startup resources through friends, family, and others in their communities and social networks.

Most small businesses startups fail due to lack of adequate funding and resources, and there is a $40 billion gap in seed funding. By combining innovative tools with the power of the Internet, 40billion.com aims to bridge the gap and enable millions more small businesses to succeed.

About half of all new businesses seek financing from the entrepreneur’s friends and family, but it can be difficult to communicate business ideas and to manage funding relationships with many people. 40billion.com simplifies everything by enabling entrepreneurs to create business plan profiles and launch fundraising drives that are viewable anywhere via the Internet. And it is free to sign up and get started.

Entrepreneurs can broadcast their business ideas and funding requests to friends and family, even post them on popular social networking websites, and the service allows many people to make loans or gift contributions ($25 up to $10,000) in support of a business, while easily tracking and receiving notifications online.

Furthermore, lenders and borrowers may download a promissory note template, which they can use to formalize business loans in a more professional manner. Loan interest rates are negotiated between the lenders and borrowers, and 40billion.com emails notifications when funding offers are received and reminders when payments are due.

As an incentive, entrepreneurs may offer product discounts and freebies in exchange for low- or no-interest funding and other much-needed resources. Soon, for added confidence, those providing the funding will be able to track how the entrepreneur spends the funds that are raised.

There are additional features available exclusively for members, including the ability to schedule online business plan presentations, an open database of service providers, a job board for posting and browsing startup jobs, and a discussion forum (a.k.a., The Elevator) where everyone can share ideas and tips about what works and what does not. Members can even follow a company as it progresses, by signing up to receive alerts whenever the entrepreneur posts company updates.

Advantages over banks and other lending websites

  • No credit score required: raise money for a business, while keeping personal finances and credit score private.
  • Private profiles: protect ideas and limit viewing to invited participants only.
  • $99,000 maximum: raise more funding than many other sites allow.
  • Gift contributions: provide an additional funding option, besides loans.
  • Targeted business network: leverage other entrepreneurs and lenders with similar interests to raise funding, find service providers, post jobs, and acquire customers.
  • Spending tracker: lenders track how the funding is spent by the entrepreneur, in order to increase peace-of-mind, transparency, and accountability.

 

Advantages over conventional friends-and-family loans

  • One-to-many: manage and track hundreds of relationships, transactions and communications at the same time; no need to make a hundred individual loan payments every month.
  • Email reminders: get reminders automatically when payments are due, and get notifications when new company updates, transactions, or offers are posted.
  • Public profiles: expand access to funding and resources by connecting with thousands of people who visit 40billion.com every month.
  • Targeted business network: leverage other entrepreneurs and lenders with similar interests to raise funding, find service providers, post jobs, and acquire customers.
  • Spending tracker: lenders track how the funding is spent by the entrepreneur, in order to increase peace-of-mind, transparency, and accountability.

 

About 40billion.com
40billion.com helps entrepreneurs raise funding for new businesses through friends and family rather than through traditional financial institutions. Using the Internet-based service, entrepreneurs connect with their social network – friends, family, friends of family, colleagues, and others in their communities – to raise capital. 40billion.com’s scalable platform facilitates the funding requests and transactions to make it easier for an entrepreneur to manage many funding relationships. 40billion.com is patent pending. For more information, visit http://www.40billion.com.

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New features to bailout small businesses and startups

November 13, 2008 Leave a Comment

In this tough economy, entrepreneurs like you are struggling to raise money to start new businesses or keep their existing businesses afloat. While big corporations are getting multi-billion dollar bailouts, who is bailing out small-business entrepreneurs? Many aspiring entrepreneurs are turning to friends and family for help during these tough times, and 40billion.com makes it easier than ever to tap into your social network and raise money for your business or idea. Here’s what we’re doing to help you, in lieu of a bailout package…

WE’VE EXTENDED YOUR RAISE

Your Raise (fundraising profile) has been extended up to one additional month, at no extra charge. Your Raise is now scheduled to end on December 13, 2008. Even if your Raise had ended, it has been reactivated with the new end date. So sign in, invite your friends and family, and start raising the money you need for your business through small loans and contributions.

WE’VE LAUNCHED NEW FEATURES

We’ve added new features and made significant improvements to help you raise money for your business. Some of these include…

* New loan document service:

Instantly generate a customized loan document to formalize a loan between friends or family, without straining your relationship.

* Posting on Facebook or MySpace:

Post links to your Raise on your Facebook or MySpace page. Increase your exposure, and allow your friends and family to access your Raise easily from your Facebook or MySpace page.

* Access to your email contact list:

Easily import your contact lists (or address books) from your existing email accounts, whether you use Yahoo, GMail, AOL, Plaxo, or Outlook. No need to type all those email addresses, when sending invitations to your friends and family.

* New default invitation messages:

You always have the ability to customize your email invitations, but we’ve made things easy for you by providing default invitation messages that are friendly and professional. Also, now when you send an invitation, the recipient does not have to sign in (or join) to view your Raise; however, they do have to sign in to offer funding and access other site features.

* New email notifications:

Now, we send you an email notification whenever you receive a loan offer or contribution, when you receive a message from someone who has viewed your Raise, and when another member grants you access to their private Raise. We do much of the work, so you can focus on your business.

…and much more.

Sign in to your account, and check out the improvements we’ve made. And with the extra time you have between now and December 13th, invite your friends and family to help you raise money for your business with a small loan or contribution towards your target.

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40billion.com Launches First Friends-and-Family Funding Network for Entrepreneurs

July 30, 2008 Leave a Comment

New Service Helps Entrepreneurs Raise Money Through Social Networks of Friends and Family

ATLANTA, Georgia – July 30, 2008 – 40billion.com (http://www.40billion.com) officially launched today as the first friends-and-family funding network for small-business entrepreneurs. The service enables entrepreneurs to raise capital through friends, family and others interested in helping the entrepreneur to succeed.

Unlike traditional bank loans and other person-to-person lending services, 40billion.com does not require a credit report or minimum credit score and does not allow loan interest rates as high as 36%, which many small-business entrepreneurs cannot afford. Instead, the entrepreneur can raise money from people they know in exchange for discounts that they offer to those investors who become customers.
“40billion.com is a great way for me to finance my startup,” said Dave Mack Jr., who is developing an online social network for theatre artists to connect and find work. “It helps me raise money affordably from many people I already know, and without worrying about ruining my relationships with them.”

Many businesses get started with financing from the entrepreneur’s friends and family, but it is often difficult to manage these relationships. 40billion.com allows many investors to give small amounts of money and spread the risk. Furthermore, the service provides communication tools to increase transparency between the entrepreneur and her investors.

To obtain funding, an entrepreneur simply uses 40billion.com to start a “Raise” (a fundraising profile) and invites friends, family and others in her social network to invest and contribute towards the funding target. 40billion.com makes it easier for entrepreneurs to share their business ideas with friends and relatives, who may want to invest and help out. Furthermore, 40billion.com handles all the transactions, so it is easier for an entrepreneur to manage having many investors. Raises are private, so potential investors must be invited by entrepreneurs or other investors.

 
“We are addressing a $40 billion gap in funding for small businesses, and our goal is to help all those hardworking entrepreneurs that have good ideas but don’t have the money or resources to get started,” said Cornelius Colin McNab, Founder of 40billion.com. “The economic downturn has led to a credit crunch, where banks and venture capitalists are tightening up, and entrepreneurs need alternative ways to gain access to affordable capital.”

McNab, who is an inventor with three patents and holds an MBA from MIT and a degree from Yale, is confident that his company can bridge the funding gap by allowing ordinary people to become investors. “That’s how we got started. Investors contribute as little as $50 or $100 each, but these small investments really add up. If forty friends and relatives contribute $100 each, that’s $4,000 that the entrepreneur can use to incorporate a business, build a website, print business cards, lease space for three months, file a provisional patent, and create a prototype or sample inventory.”

Currently released as a beta version, 40billion.com soon will offer more funding options (including loans), social networking features, and a unique rating system to enhance the quality of entrepreneurs and build investor confidence.

Advantages of 40billion.com

  • No credit report or sales history required
  • Multiple funding options
  • Private, invitation-only profiles
  • Exclusive entrepreneur features, e.g., live presentations online
  • Search-engine to find business resources
  • Profiles with embedded videos and PowerPoint presentations
  • Investors receive social returns, financial returns, and discounts

 

About 40billion.com

40billion.com helps entrepreneurs raise money for businesses through friends and family rather than through traditional financial institutions. Using the Internet-based service, entrepreneurs connect with their social network – friends, family, friends of family, colleagues, and others – to raise capital. 40billion.com’s scalable platform facilitates the funding requests and transactions to make it easier for an entrepreneur to manage many investors. 40billion.com is patent pending. For more information, visit http://www.40billion.com

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