- Company is disappointed by the ICO results, not shocked.
- Investors can wait for the new ICO or request for a refund.
- A much simpler token sale is in the works.
Civil’s Initial Coin Offering that was meant to fund the company’s efforts to create a new blockchain platform for streamlining journalism may not have attracted sufficient interest. The company has canceled the ICO and is refunding money to investors as it goes back to the drawing board.
ICO Not up to the Expectations
Civil founder Matthew Iles said in an official blog post last week the company had raised some $1.3 million from 681 investors with $1.1 million coming from ConsenSys. The company reported last Tuesday, October 16, 2018, it was canceling the token sale and that all those who bought tokens will receive full refunds. Potential investors who had already bought token can wait for the new ICO or request for a refund on October 29, 2018. Iles stated:
“We are not where we wanted to be at this point in the sale when we started out […] civil is not going anywhere. The Civil Media Company is here to stay […] the CVL token sale didn’t succeed [….] a new, much simpler token sale is in the works. We’ll be sharing details on that soon.”
Civil’s fundraising ran for two weeks but the company was forced to extend the deadline as it sought to attract investors to back its CVL tokens. Civil’s idea was to allow owners of tokens to use their tokens to vote in governance and registry system to determine which of its journalists can publish on the platform. The company had in June said it had enlisted 100 journalists from 15 leading media organizations.
All is Not Lost
Once the company distributes the new tokens, they plan to launch three new features namely blockchain-based publishing plugin for WordPress, a community governance application dubbed The Civil Registry and a developer tool that will allow non-blockchain developers to build their own Apps on Civil.
Blockchain Venture studio ConsenSys invested $5 million on Civil last fall and has agreed to buy $3.5 million worth of the new tokens. They have committed capital from the token sale to the Civil Foundation, an independent non-profit entity that will fund grants to newsrooms that will join Civil’s network.
Civil’s Chief executive officer Matthew Iles said the results disappointed the company, but they were not shocked. The company had reached out to leading newsrooms like The New York Times, The Washington Post, Dow Jones, and Axios, among others, but failed to incite interest in its token. However, Civil had signed partnerships with the likes of Associated Press and Forbes which confirm the token sale doesn’t affect their partnership.
