Israel-based equity crowdfunding firm OurCrowd raises $72M Series C for global expansion and additional capital to co-invest in startups that use its platform
The Jerusalem-based equity crowdfunding firm has invested more than $300 million to date, mostly in Israeli start-ups
Context & Ripple Effects
In 2016 OurCrowd is still primarily a Jerusalem-based equity crowdfunding firm with over $300M deployed, mostly into Israeli startups, and this $72M Series C is the round that pushes it toward a hybrid model: institutional-scale capital sitting alongside its crowd of individual investors. The raise funds two things at once — geographic expansion beyond Israel, and a co-investment pool so OurCrowd can put its own balance sheet behind startups already raising on the platform.
The subsequent arc confirms the pivot held: by 2018 the firm had launched Cognitiv Ventures, a $100M fund for AI, deep learning, and robotics, and by 2021 it was taking money from SoftBank Vision Fund 2 while PitchBook counted 280+ portfolio companies and 30 funds. The Series C is the hinge between pure crowdfunding intermediary and multi-vehicle asset manager.
First-order effects
- Startups raising on OurCrowd's platform now face a lead investor with skin in the game — the co-invest capital means the platform itself takes positions rather than only brokering crowd money, changing negotiation dynamics for founders.
- The global expansion mandate moves OurCrowd's sourcing beyond the Israeli pipeline that accounted for most of its first $300M, putting it in direct competition with local VCs in new markets.
Second-order effects
- Traditional venture firms competing for Israeli deals now bid against a platform that aggregates retail capital plus its own co-investment — a structurally different cost of capital, as later validated when SoftBank Vision Fund 2 wrote a check into the same vehicle.
- Israeli founders gain an alternative to the domestic VC ladder just as the ecosystem hits record volume — the same market where startups went on to raise $10.5B in a single year with 30 rounds above $100M.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, equity crowdfunding platforms consolidate into hybrid asset managers — crowd-sourced LP bases topped up by institutional checks like SoftBank's — blurring the line between crowdfunding portal and venture fund.
- For Israel's startup economy, platforms like OurCrowd become export infrastructure: they channel foreign capital into Start-Up Nation deal flow without requiring startups to relocate or re-domicile.
The trend: Equity crowdfunding platforms are evolving into hybrid venture vehicles that blend retail crowd capital with institutional co-investment, using their deal flow as the asset.