Introduction
Investing in startups can be intimidating for both the investor and for the startups trying to take in funding for their success. For the average retail consumer, it’s challenging to place your hard earned money into something other than the latest and hottest stocks, as investing into newer companies can be just as risky as they are rewarding. For startups, they are taking the risk head on and need incubation and assistance to progress their visions and goals as a team.
In the blockchain and crypto industry, a large barrier was removed with the retail investing and startup process called an Initial Decentralized Exchange Offering, unanimously abbreviated to IDO for short. This is a chance for investors to participate in token offerings by crypto startups with an equal opportunity for success. But now that IDOs have matured, there are new complexities on where to find the best IDOs and optimal user experiences. IDO launchpads help this tremendously.
Let’s take a look at what IDO launchpads are how to find the best one for your interests and needs.
IDO Launchpads At a Glance
In short IDO launchpads are places that give space for crypto and blockchain startups so that they can have exposure to everyone of interest that wished to participate in their platform. Most of the time, this participation results in buying and holding a token that the startup belongs to and represents a great way for companies to gain necessary fundraising for MVPs, roadmaps and goals, and to overly help the crypto ecosystem grow.
IDO launchpads have been largely successful over recent years. According to market capitalization via Crypto Rank, the top IDO launchpads have been valued at up to $6.8 billion USD, with a small handful of them bringing in over one billion USD each. Launchpads have brought in some of the best projects to date and give millions of people a chance to participate.
The Benefits of IDO Launchpads
Overall, there are some major benefits to having and using an IDO launchpad both as a startup and retail investor.
- Accessibility: For IDO launchpads, investors have much easier availability and access to finding a startup to invest in at an early stage. In many countries and in traditional startup environments, the average consumer does not get to participate in investing until a much later date, well after the startup has been successful to the wider public audience. The IDO process lets them participate much earlier and IDO launchpads give a much lower barrier of entry.
- Fairness: the idea that the average consumer in a legacy startup environment cant participate until a later date seems unfair to most. IDO launchpads create a much more equal opportunity regardless of how much money you have, where you are located in the world, or who you know within a selective network.
- Transparency: IDO launchpads present a much more open and transparent system where most people, invested or not, can see the results of an IDO event, the startups that are involved, and the overall success of the platform. In many traditional markets, all of this is done behind the scenes and can be susceptible to questionable methods. IDO launchpads are built around transparency and decentralization.
Finding the Right IDO Launchpad
Launchpads and crypto-based fundraising have been on an explosive track in recent years, largely for the betterment of the crypto industry as a whole. While this has been a great thing, this also opens up business opportunities for more people to launch their own launchpads, making it harder to find one with higher quality than the rest. Today, there are some great launchpads and some that are not so great. It can be a minefield if you are unaware of what to look for.
Finding the right IDO launchpad can be challenging but it’s important to look for a few bulletproof methods to make sure they are top of the line.
- Quality: when looking for an IDO launchpad, are they ambiguous to the public or are they showing comprehensive information? For an investor, it’s important that you are as informed as possible about startup information, networking, and partnerships of both the company and the launchpad itself, and how they do business. Many launchpads have offerings where very little is known or shared with a consumer, which is also a sign they might be hiding information from the startups themselves or even worse – manipulating terms of conditions. A good rule of thumb is the less you know about both the launchpad and the startup, the higher the risk. Finding an IDO launchpad that is very transparent is a great step to finding a good place to do business.
- Equal Investment Opportunity: since one of the reasons for an IDO launchpad is to create fairness, it stands to reason that everyone actually has a much better chance of participating in a token event. A good IDO launchpad will state very cle?
- Multi-chain Support: with the rise of more launchpads comes the necessity of bringing higher quality support to the average investor. As the blockchain ecosystem grows, so do the projects on many chains. With all the EVM chains available along with startups on others like Solana, Polygon, and Avalanche, it’s almost a requirement that IDO launchpads should offer multiple chains on their platform to keep up with user interest.
What An IDO Launchpad Needs To Be
On the outside looking in, what an IDO launchpad should do is give both the investor and the startups what they need to progress their goals. Retail users just want to find a project that can be part of and take on the associated risk and reward with that choice. Startups need funding to help facilitate their growth. As long as IDO launchpads can do this effectively, this is most of the battle in being a great launchpad.
Conclusion
Early stage crypto and blockchain investing can be a scary thing for everyone. There is a lot of vision being shared and money being shuffled. But picking the right IDO launchpad for your needs, no matter who you are, will make things that much easier in participating in this one of a kind industry. Choosing the right launchpad means finding one that aligns with your goals, but also gives fairness, transparency, high quality projects to choose from, and has the multi-chain support needed for the future. Learn more about Scaleswap IDO launch process and make the right choice.