Crowdfunding is forcing venture capital outside of the Silicon Valley bubble

Kickstarter projects are having real impact, according to a new study.

The success of crowdfunding platforms and projects completed through those platforms has helped to expand investment by venture capitalists outside Silicon Valley, University of California — Berkeley and Yale University researchers found.

When Kickstarter projects in areas of the country that don't see interest from venture capitalists succeed, investors seem to become more interested in those parts of the country. Successful crowdfunding campaigns attract VC interest both to the people running campaigns outside major tech hubs and to those parts of the country in general.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

"VCs are demanding successful crowdfunding campaigns as proof," said study author Lee Fleming, faculty director of the Coleman Fung Institute for Engineering Leadership at UC Berkeley. "It's almost like a market test when they're looking at potential investments."

A 1 percent increase in the number of Kickstarter campaigns in a region in one year predicted a 0.097 percent increase in venture capital interest the following year, the study found.

The study focused on Kickstarter and did not include other crowdfunding platforms. Within Kickstarter, researchers honed in on the campaigns — mainly tech projects — that would be of interest to traditional Silicon Valley investors. They discounted Kickstarter's many arts-centric crowdfunding campaigns, like ones to fund the making of a film.

The study also pared down VC investments to small investments in early-stage companies that would be most similar to crowdfunding initiatives. Researchers eliminated areas of investment, like biotech, that cannot be funded on Kickstarter.

"As [crowdfunding] has gained legitimacy and entrepreneurs have learned how to use [crowdfunding] platforms, it may increasingly become a complementary source of funds to VC," the study's authors wrote in an article in the journal Science.

This research hasn't yet answered a few remaining questions: Are there particular types of VCs who are paying attention to crowdfunding? Within the category of tech, are particular crowdfunded projects getting attention from investors?

But it has shown that crowdfunding has the potential to make investment more accessible to Americans outside the Bay Area.

"If these trends continue, the rise of [crowdfunding] may not only fund more innovation in a more diverse set of places but also expand access to VC and other forms of finance in these same regions," the authors wrote.

"All regions and all people have ideas, and crowdfunding is enabling those people to get some funding for those ideas," Fleming said. "After they develop successful ones, they become candidates for VC investment."