The three FinTech startups we’re profiling this week all capitalize on the collective to engage consumers with their products. One capitalizes on crowdfunding, the second on “Crowdborrowing,” and the third on the pooling of resources.
- FundMyPro — Created by former NFL star Corey Jackson, FundMyPro is a platform designed for professional athletes to attract fans to crowdfund their charitable work. Bringing together the recent crowdfunding boom and the personal fan followings of famous athletes for worthy causes, FundMyPro will surely take off.
- ShareRate brings “crowdborrowing” to the masses. Crowdborrowing enables borrowers to share the risk of loans, significantly reducing interest premiums. ShareRate created the first ever “at-cost” consumer loan product for a low fixed rate service fee across all grades of borrowers. We admire the company’s vision and ambition: “[Our] CrowdBorrowing technology is an overwhelmingly disruptive innovation to the traditional finance model within the multi-trillion dollar unsecured loans market that will positively impact both consumers and lenders industry-wide and provide an investment platform scalable in the billions.”
- LETZ — LETZ allows consumers to pool all of their loyalty points from every loyalty program they are subscribed to and spend them like money. How many loyalty points are out there? Apparently a lot, since LETZ claims that “on average a consumer household is a member of more than 18 different loyalty programs.” It would be hard for anyone to keep all of these straight. While it’s not clear exactly how the model works, the solution should add value for both consumers and merchants.