Big Venture Capital Opportunities Open Now For Everyday Investors

Over the next few weeks, The Juice will start reviewing private equity investing platforms. In November, we’ll cover StartEngine, Fundrise and Yieldstreet, focusing on the types of alternative investments they offer and how you can participate. In December, we’ll hit a few others, including WeFunder, before spending early 2025 on constructing a traditional meets alternatives investment portfolio. 

Washington, D.C. be damned, we’re excited about the investing landscape in the United States of America! 

Between commission-free stock and ETF trading, fractional share investing (which we’ll also discuss next week) and access to alts once only available to the wealthy, the investment playing field has never been more level. It’s far from equal, but retail investors have made great strides. We’ve come a long way from Kickstarter campaigns. 

Today, we look at a couple of the more interesting venture capital opportunities. 

As we have mentioned, StartEngine is a platform that gives investors access to both investing in startups as well as the opportunity to purchase shares in some of the largest private companies via StartEngine Private. The firm calls StartEngine Private “your portal to gain exposure to venture-backed businesses without spending millions.” 

One potential downside of StartEngine Private is that it’s only open to accredited investors. The SEC defines what that means here. But, basically, you have to be somewhat wealthy. Like we said, the playing field has improved, but it ain’t level!   

Interestingly, you can use the StartEngine platform… to invest in StartEngine.

According to StartEngine, it doubled its year-over-year revenue during the first half of 2024. And StartEngine Private is responsible for more than half of that increase. So there are apparently lots of accredited investors out there using the service. 

StartEngine Private accounted for $11.5 million of StartEngine’s total revenue of $21.6 million between January and June of this year. 

If you’re bullish on these platforms that facilitate private company investing, consider StartEngine. So far, StartEngine has raised $80 million from more than 45,000 investors to help fund itself. 

With the minimum investment of $500, you can secure 400 shares of StartEngine, valued at $1.25 per share. With the backing of SharkTank’s Kevin O’Leary (though not merely because of his support!), The Juice thinks a speculative investment in StartEngine makes sense, particularly if you start relatively small. 

But, by all means, go big. You do you. 

Ultimately, we believe in the future of these types of portals and The Juice considers StartEngine a pioneer and leader in the space. 

One of the biggest (as in, most funded and popular) opportunities on StartEngine is in a company called Moonbeam. The company previously raised more than $8 million on StartEngine and has raised another $8 million-plus in a round that’s set to end in mid-December. 

The minimum investment is $648 and would get you 81 shares at $8.00 per share (at that amount, there is an additional $22.68 fee). 

Moonbeam is an artificial intelligence company. Here’s its description straight from StartEngine:

AtomBeam’s AI software technologies are force multipliers for machine data communications, enabling up to 2-4x more data to be sent over existing networks with the potential for added security…

AtomBeam’s current and former customers include the USAF, the U.S. Space Force, and Saab. AtomBeam has also entered into partnership relationships with several companies, including: Viasat, Nvidia, Intel, and HPE. The company was awarded $2.4M+ in defense contracts in 2023 and holds 40 patents for defensible momentum.

The Juice thinks that qualifies as lofty and intriguing. 

The Bottom Line: What’s equally as intriguing is that the opportunities in the alt investing space are practically endless. Not too long ago, investing in a company such as Moonbeam was literally out of reach for small investors. 

While there’s risk that they’ll never make it, that’s the nature of venture capital investing. High risk and potentially high reward.

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