GC GAME GOING GLOBAL
Crowd-funding campaign for international expansion
THE boss of a hologram technology company that launched its first centre on the Gold Coast hopes its ‘transparent’ earnings entices investors to stump up cash for worldwide expansion.
Euclideon opened its first Hologram Entertainment Centre on the Gold Coast in Southport in 2015.
It offered visitors the chance to view and interact with holographic light projections of swimming turtles, dinosaurs and an African safari.
In 2019 it shut the Southport centre and opened a new one in the Paradise Centre in Surfers Paradise branded as Holoverse Dinosaur World. It took $200,000 in the three months to March before coronavirus restrictions hit trade. A centre at Westfield Carindale followed in July.
Euclideon, led by CEO Bruce Dell, has launched an equity crowd-funding campaign to raise $800,000 for two new centres in Finland and another in the US or Sydney.
Shares in the new entity – the public unlisted company Euclideon Entertainment – are likely to be priced at $1 with quarterly dividends on offer.
Mr Dell acknowledged investing via equity crowd funding is high risk but said the rewards could be enormous.
A 40 per cent stake is being offered in the Euclideon Entertainment, meaning investors will be entitled ot 40 per cent of the profits, he said.
“If $1 million was made (from each centre) you would get 100 per cent return on your money. That is hypothetical but not impossible,” he said.
Mr Dell said such was the demand from shopping centres owners, they have been offered space for free in one for the first two years.
“A lot of people see us as an anchor tenant,” Mr Dell said. “What our data shows is people are prepared to travel to come to us so it makes the centre a destination.”
Mr Dell said the plan for the next three or four years was to build 40 centres in the US with the initial location in Texas already identified.
The former head of Nokia Digital, Matti Kattilakoski, was on board to drive expansion, Mr Dell said.
“The US is attractive because wages are half (of what they are in Australia) and rent is a third,” he said. “If America stops being like The Walking Dead and recovers will be a good place for us.”
Cake Equity CEO Jason Atkins, a former chief financial officer at Zuppy Property Group and finance manager at MasterCard, said he was a “big advocate of early stage investments”.
“They quite often go on to be big employers and have ultra high growth rates if successful,” he said.
“However, it is important to look at each investment on its merits but protect yourself by having diversification with your early stage investments with 20 companies.”
Mr Atkins said most investors would allocate between five and 10 per cent of their portfolio to high-risk investments.
The Euclideon offer, via crowd-funding platform Equitise, opens on January 12.
The minimum investment is $250 and maximum is $10,000 in line with crowdsourced funding legislation.
Euclideon Entertainment is owned by Euclideon Holographics Holdings, which has 80 million of 83.96m shares.
A LOT OF PEOPLE SEE US AS AN ANCHOR TENANT. WHAT OUR DATA SHOWS IS PEOPLE ARE PREPARED TO TRAVEL TO COME TO US SO IT MAKES THE CENTRE A DESTINATION EUCLIDION CEO BRUCE DELL