Indiegogo now lets entrepreneurs offer backers equity in their projects; Indiegogo will get a cash fee of 7% of funds raised, plus 2% stake in equity campaigns
Stacy Cowley / New York Times :
Context & Ripple Effects
By late 2016, Indiegogo had already been extending the life of campaigns past their funding window with its InDemand pre-order feature; offering backers equity is the next rung — turning the platform from a storefront into a financial intermediary that owns a piece of what it hosts. The 7%-plus-2%-stake structure means Indiegogo's revenue no longer ends when a campaign does.
The surrounding coverage shows how contested platform economics were at this moment: within a year, GoFundMe would drop its 5% platform fee for personal campaigns in favor of tips, while Indiegogo kept stacking new revenue lines — a product marketplace, mandatory backer updates, and ICO listings through an SEC-registered portal.
First-order effects
- Entrepreneurs gain a way to convert their backer base into an investor base, while Indiegogo books both an immediate 7% cash fee and a continuing 2% equity position in every equity campaign it hosts.
- Backers who take equity now bear securities-style risk on a platform previously built around product pre-orders, raising the diligence burden on campaigns.
Second-order effects
- Competing platforms face a pricing fork: match Indiegogo's take-rate-plus-stake model or compete on cheaper, simpler fees — the direction GoFundMe chose by eliminating its platform fee entirely.
- Equity campaigns raise accountability stakes, which foreshadows Indiegogo's own move to compel monthly development updates to backers as more money with legal claims flows through the site.
Third-order effects
- If platforms keep taking ownership positions in the projects they host, crowdfunding sites evolve into de facto startup portfolios — a structure Indiegogo extended toward token sales via its SEC-registered portal link before ultimately being acquired by Gamefound, which reset pricing to a flat 5% fee.
- The long-run pattern suggests hybrid fee-plus-equity models struggle against simple flat fees once crowdfunding consolidates, pushing equity-like fundraising toward regulated portals rather than generalist platforms.
The trend: Crowdfunding platforms are drifting from per-campaign service fees toward deeper financial intermediation — holding stakes, hosting securities, and bundling post-campaign commerce — before consolidation pulls them back to flat-fee simplicity.