Lithuanian Startup Kicks off New Coin Model, Mulls IPO
Lithuania-headquartered sports and health data monetization company Lympo announced that it will distribute 20% of the company shares to its token holders in the upcoming 12 months. The startup also plans an initial public offering (IPO) in an unspecified future, according to the company‘s CEO and founder Ada Jonušė.
“Together with our lawyers we worked out a new model: Public coin equity distribution. This model will allow companies, starting from Lympo.io, to offer real company equity for our token holders,” according to Jonušė.
Lympo claims that it introduces a multi-purpose token which will be both used as a utility token and allow its holders to receive equity on top. “Thousands of people should become part of the company in the upcoming 12 months,” according to the announcement. The company closed its token sale on February 27 reaching the ETH 14,625 (USD 8.5 million) hard cap and selling 625 million LYM tokens to more than 8,000 contributors from around the world, as previously reported.
The distribution will be based on the number of LYM held by its token holders as well as the the duration of their holdings, which will be expressed in a number of points to be constantly updated in a public database, the company explained. The ceiling of max 1% ownership will be introduced in order to prevent the domination of a few big holders, it added.
“In most cases, token holders have no say in critical decisions of a company and, most importantly, receive no transparency. Besides, the market is very unstable and many tokens lose their value because of the volatility of the major cryptocurrencies,“ Jonušė said.
More details about the process are yet to be announced, according to the CEO. Also, she did not elaborate on the IPO plans, only saying that the company’s “mission is to grow Lympo into a powerful company”.
It seems that the Lithuanian startup is not the only one considering providing ownership in a company through a token sale.
Earlier this week, Kevin O’Leary, chairman of an investment company O’Shares Investments and investor at an American television series “Shark Tank”, told CNBC he’s working on a deal to allow a “very prestigious brand hotel” in New York sell ownership in the company through a USD 400 million cryptocurrency offering instead of a stock IPO.
“You will be an owner of a third of this hotel,” he said.
O’Leary said the hotel asset-backed ICO he’s involved with would adhere to government securities rules and offer prospective investors the kind of marketing materials they get with stock initial public offerings.
With the markets showing downward trends in the recent months, such initiatives could start a new wave of more secure and more regulated coin offerings in the future, according to Lympo.
Kevin O’Leary on CNBC:
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Disclosure: Among advisors of Lympo is Antanas Guoga, Member of European Parliament, a serial entrepreneur, investor, and backer of Cryptonews.com.
