RocketHub Cofounder on His Startup That Sold for Millions
By Monica Rozenfeld
Brian Meece was a musician and filmmaker when he helped found RocketHub in 2009. The startup was one of the first crowdfunding platforms to hit the market. Meece was looking for a way to help artists raise money online for their creative endeavors, but the site did not fully take off until science researchers and entrepreneurs used it to seek funding from the public.
RocketHub was acquired in 2015—in a deal valued at US $15 million—by EFactor Group, an online resource center for entrepreneurs. The crowdfunding platform now will be used solely to help raise money for startups. RocketHub initiated tens of thousands of projects on its platform in its first five years, with almost half collecting funds, Meece says. Amounts ranged from $100 to $500,000. The company took up to an 8 percent commission of the total amount raised.
Meece was a speaker at last year’s IEEE N3XT, which helps entrepreneurs launch and grow their ventures. At the October event, in Toronto, he spoke about founding, scaling, and exiting RocketHub. He was also featured in the A&E Networks documentary, The Startup Factor, which follows small businesses as they take their ventures to the next level.
