CEO Antony Tolfts said the strong reception from the market was testament to the company's goal to provide an unconflicted pipeline for sophisticated investors to access secondary deals; for brokers to expand the universe of investment opportunities for clients; and for companies to maximise their raise capabilities.
"Our goal when we opened the platform in June was to execute 60 deals in our first year," he said. "We were able to achieve nearly double that in just over four months, and our pipeline is only getting stronger. It's been very exciting to see the enthusiasm from both brokers and investors as we prove our model in the Australian market."
Post -IPO raisings dwarf IPOs on the ASX - in 2021 companies raised $60B in Post-IPO vs $13B in IPOs. However, access for investors - which includes sophisticated individual investors as well as investment funds and hedge funds - has traditionally been patchy and dependent upon broker relationships. In turn, broker access to these deals in dependent upon relationships with the companies themselves, which are by definition limited in their distribution to the clients of their chosen brokers. This, Tolfts says, creates a fragmented landscape where no parties are ultimately best served.
"The concept of a DCRP is not new - but we are doing things a bit differently," he said. "Blu Horseshoe does not offer any other products other than the DCRP, nor do we compete with brokers by bringing our own deals to the platform. Our team comes from a deep financial services background, and while our technology is well designed and simple to set up and use, we're not positioning ourselves as a technology company - service is first and foremost what we offer."
Blu Horseshoe's foundation investors include Aspermont, International Pacific Capital, and Singapore-based Spark Plus. The company is already facilitating access to the Australian market for qualified international investors, and plans to expand internationally in future.
Blu Horseshoe's core team includes Tolfts, who has worked at the Sydney Stock Exchange, Computershare, Barclay's Private Bank and HSBC; Operations chief Pathhik Vora, who has held roles at NZX, Ord Minnett, Pershing, JP Morgan, OpenMarkets and CommSec; and Chief Product Director Abi Obasanya who has headed up digital product and strategy for companies including Aspermont, Resonant Design and Rivers & Grey.
"The next 12 months will be focused on embedding Blu Horseshoe as a core element of the secondary market infrastructure in Australia," Tolfts said. "After that, we'll see what makes sense - it's a very exciting time for a company like ours."
FREE WHITE PAPER
Digital Capital Raising Platforms: The 'under the radar' Investment Opportunity worth Billions
This white paper explains the concept of Digital Capital Raising Platforms, discusses the problems associated with the small number of DCRPs currently operating in the Australian market, and shows how Blu Horseshoe cuts through these problems to match sophisticated and professional investors with a wider range of secondary raising opportunities than ever before.
For more information and interviews with Antony Tolfts:
Anneke Senden asenden@thecontinuumpartners.com +61 410 059 820
Kristin Westlake kwestlake@thecontinuumpartners.com +61 416 219 358
