GoFundMe Gets Undisclosed Funding Led by Accel Partners, TCV

GoFundMe image used with permission

GoFundMe, a San Diego-based crowdfunding startup, has sold a majority stake to an investor group led by Accel Partners and Technology Crossover Ventures, according to a report this morning on The Wall Street Journal’s website for tech news.

GoFundMe, which operates a website that enables individuals and charities to raise funds for tragedies and good causes, did not immediately respond to a query from Xconomy.

Hundreds of thousands of people have used GoFundMe to raise over $1.1 billion from 13 million donors for a host of charitable causes, according to the company.

For example, an account established to raise funds for the Irish students involved in a June 16 balcony collapse in Berkeley has raised more than $221,000 in just over a week. The collapse resulted in six fatalities and seven serious injuries.

According to the WSJ website, GoFundMe co-founders Brad Damphousse and Andy Ballester “are relinquishing control and reaping a fortune.” They founded GoFundMe in San Diego in 2010, and used the company’s revenue to fund its growth. GoFundMe charges 5 percent in fees per transaction, according to the WSJ website.

Accel venture partner Rob Solomon, a former Groupon COO and Yahoo executive, will be taking over as CEO. Solomon told the Journal he plans to establish a GoFundMe office in Silicon Valley.

GoFundMe revealed the deal without much detail in a June 18 blog entry that says the unspecified investment includes Greylock, Meritech Capital, and Stripes Group. According to the entry, “Their collective experience building global, world-class companies (like Airbnb, Facebook, Netflix, and Spotify) can help further elevate GoFundMe to its full potential, so that even more people can raise money online for the things that matter to them most.”

The deal, which is expected to close within two weeks, will value the San Diego company at around $600 million, according to the WSJ website.

Irish Students Berkeley Tragedy Fund (courtesy GoFundMe)
Irish Students Berkeley Tragedy Fund (courtesy GoFundMe)

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.