# Q1 2021 Investor Update | Wefunder

- Canonical URL: https://wefunder.com/feed/143805
- Entity ID: wefunder:feed_item:143805
- Published at: 2021-04-16 20:41:52 UTC
- Updated at: 2025-07-15 15:06:56 UTC

## Author
Nick Tommarello

## Subject
Wefunder

## Content
Dear Investors,The first quarter of 2021 was the most productive time in Wefunder's history.&nbsp;Everyone on our team worked insane hours to prepare for the law reforms that rolled out on March 15th. It paid off. Our growth chart is worth 1000 words:Metrics$272M GMV run rate.&nbsp;Over Q1, we had $68M of investments & reservations. Growth is accelerating. January: $16.2M. February: $19.3M. March: $32.1M.6X Year over Year Growth.&nbsp;Q1 2021 is $68M. 2020 was $10.6M.&nbsp;&nbsp;$11.5M revenue run rate.&nbsp; We earned just short of $1M per month in February and March. (We earn revenue after rounds close. The revenue that will come from the $32M of March commitments will likely hit at the end of Q2).&nbsp;&nbsp;Profitable. We've been profitable over the entirety of Q1.&nbsp;&nbsp;Raised $6M.&nbsp;$160M pre-money. We closed a Reg D round of ~$2.5M on March 12th from accredited investors. On March 15th, we opened a Regulation Crowdfunding round with over $3M of commitments to date. After we close in May, we expect to have over $10M of cash in the bank.&nbsp;41% Q1 market share. According to Kingscrowd, Wefunder has 41% market share in Reg CF over Q1. Republic is 25% and StartEngine 23%. Our advantage is growing. Our March 2021 market share increased to 44%.3+ IPOs.&nbsp;I'm aware of 3 startups funded by us that are preparing for an IPO.&nbsp;Gingko Bioworks - preparing a $20 Billion IPO - is one not confidential.&nbsp;&nbsp;Q1 Work HighlightsOur recent growth was a result of tremendous sacrifice by the Wefunder team to prepare for the new law changes that rolled out on March 15th. Some include:New branding& design.&nbsp;We made a new design system, and then applied it to a new home page, company profile, and founder page.&nbsp;We'll roll it out to the rest of Wefunder's web site over 2021.&nbsp;&nbsp;PBC Impact Report.&nbsp;Our team made a beautiful Public Benefit Corporation Impact Report&nbsp;to quantify our social impact.&nbsp;&nbsp; SPVs.&nbsp;Using the new laws, we pioneered a way for every company on Wefunder to use an SPV at no cost to either issuers or investors.&nbsp;This was important to convince startups with other funding options to use Wefunder.&nbsp;&nbsp;35+ YC companies launched. We used the new laws to convince&nbsp;dozens of Y Combinator startups&nbsp;to raise on Wefunder. These are the caliber of startups that have plenty of other funding options. We consider this a good signal that the new laws are now good enough to compete with accredited angels & VCs.Self-Service Platform: Launch in 10 minutes. Using the new laws, startups can start "testing the waters" with potential investors in under 10 minutes.&nbsp;(It used to take them a month to do compliance work first). We expect this to be the main growth driver for Wefunder over 2021.Internal tooling.&nbsp;We've had more investments in Q1 than almost all of 2020.&nbsp;We improved our software to better automate and streamline our operations.In order to accomplish this, our entire team - about 30 employees - quarantined together in Lake Tahoe in March and worked alongside each other 24/7.Main ChallengeOur biggest challenge: our growth has been exponential, but our hiring has been static. Our full-time team is under 30 people. Most of our competitors have over 2X more people. We have more traction then almost the rest of the industry combined... but with one-third to one-half the team size of our main competitors.From 2012-2020, we kept our team very lean. That's how we survived until the laws were reformed. But now it's holding us back: in product, in customer support, and in operations. In some ways, we're a startup with Series B traction, but with barely a Series A-sized team.&nbsp;We need to fix that ASAP.&nbsp;Thankfully, we have more than enough cash to do so.&nbsp;&nbsp;Recruiting is now our top priority.&nbsp;That's the only way to ride this dragon without falling off to our deaths.&nbsp;&nbsp;Ask for HelpOur most critical priority is hiring across the board.&nbsp;If you know a candidate, please send them to our jobs page&nbsp;or ask them to email me at nick@wefunder.com.&nbsp;&nbsp;Some roles we are hiring for:Product DesignerVisual DesignerPayments EngineerProduct EngineerHead of TalentHR ManagerHead of Customer SupportHead of MarketingHead of EUHead of Social MediaFounder in ResidenceVenture PartnerBusiness DevelopmentHead of SalesHead of GrowthControllerCompliance ManagerHead of Community...&nbsp;or anyone, smart, driven, hungry to achieve, and fits our cultural values.&nbsp;We can always create a role for the right kind of person.&nbsp;&nbsp;Most of us are in SF, but we're opening other offices across the US and in the EU.&nbsp;&nbsp;Thank youWefunder now has over 5,000 investors.&nbsp;Some of you backed us as early as 2012.&nbsp;Some have just recently invested.&nbsp;&nbsp;From the bottom of my heart, thank you for your support.&nbsp;We'll work our hardest to justify your belief in us.&nbsp;We hope the best is yet to come.&nbsp;&nbsp;