The PIPE General Fund Launchpad (PGF Launchpad) Main-net alpha is finally here after the success of our test-net phase for community feedback released in February 2024. Our Launchpad is a cutting edge web3 based funding solution which along with the PIPE platform (Pre IPO exchange),our web2 real world assets partner project aims to solve the European Paradox. What is the European Paradox you might be wondering? Let’s take a closer look.
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This refers to a state of affairs where European Universities are regularly producing groundbreaking lab innovations from a pool of gifted researchers whose inventions overwhelmingly fail to reach commercial success as start up companies. Okay, so what causes this problem? What’s needed to solve it? We’re going to address the question for you.
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Restrictions in the European structure:
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As you can see these challenges while important seem quite niche to the average reader but we think you’re the average person on the street. Problems like this are probably what peaks your interest about types of innovative solutions that can solve them. So here’s the answer to the second question to satisfy your curiosity.Â
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Overcoming the European Paradox:
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We’ve built a hybrid web3/web2 platform ecosystem to start overcoming these challenges of course and here’s how.
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The PIPE General Fund (PGF) Launchpad is a web3-based membership platform designed to fund very early-stage university tokenised R&D/IP ideas and innovations within Europe with up to 2 million Euro in seed funding. The platform aims to support and accelerate the development of groundbreaking projects that have the potential to make a real-world impact.By providing funding, mentorship, and resources, the PGF Launchpad empowers entrepreneurs to turn their ideas into reality.
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The PGFÂ Launchpad Membership stands out from other platforms in several ways:
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Our Novel Approach
Unique Commercialisation Process
Secure Intellectual Property Protection for Real World Assets
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Environmental Sustainability
We are committed to supporting environmental solutions that address pressing issues such as climate change, resource conservation, and sustainable development. Our platform is open to entrepreneurs who are developing technologies, products, or services that promote environmental sustainability.
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Societal Impact
Our platform also focuses on ideas and innovations that have a positive societal impact.We welcome entrepreneurs who are working on projects related to education, healthcare, poverty alleviation, and social equality. Our goal is to support initiatives that improve the lives of individuals and communities.
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Commercial Viability
The PIPE Platform is open to commercial ideas and innovations from various industries. Whether it's a new product, service, or business model, we welcome entrepreneurs who are looking to make a positive impact in the marketplace.
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With this approach our Launchpad empowers you as a pioneering retail investor to make positive changes in our society whilst also reaping the ROI rewards from early stage impact investment opportunities from universities that are otherwise inaccessible from the comfort of your web3 wallet. Giving you the power as an early adopter to disrupt and disintermediate VCs as well as other TradFi that are holding back up to 85% of European impact innovations that could change the world for the better if they ever saw the light of day. Now they can be with you in the driver's seat.The platform is open to all on permissionless blockchains networks, does not require registration, fully automated through smart contracts and therefore isn't controlled by us unlike traditional investment funds.
University derived projects from research teams typically have a 4x greater propensity to survive and thrive in the key 4-7 year development window versus non-university start-ups.  This is due to a research focus on proving key principles, often over many years, BEFORE the idea or innovation is ready to be seen in the real world.  Most universities use Technology readiness Levels (TRL) to determine where any project is on the development spectrum and the majority of projects seen by PIPE and the PGF Launchpad will be at TRL 2-4, meaning projects have proven often complex operations and demonstrated viability.  The PIPE Platform and Lab to IPO Pathway is designed to move these projects from low levels of TRL toward TRL 9, thus providing a clear technical, business, operational and funding roadmap with up to €2 million in patient, timely and tranched investment, that moves very exciting, early stage research from Lab to IPO.
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The PGF Launchpad gets it’s revenue from deducting a one-off percentage fee (10%) from each deposit known as “levy penny” to fund operational expenses and ecosystem development. This fee is transparent through the blockchain and enforced automatically by smart contract. Nothing is hidden from you and you see exactly how much revenue is generated by us 24/7 in real time. There are no withdrawal, management or capital gains fees for our members. Giving to you significant savings on fees for your impact investments.Â
- Highlight how this model makes it accessible and financially attractive compared to traditional funding methods.Â
This differs from the VC model which is designed to find project outliers, or opportunities that can produce a 100-300x ROI.  Outliers are rare and VCs expect to lose 90% of the time and so only back projects that can demonstrate this 100-300x ROI and to survive they need to charge multiple fees on the money raised.  Whether it is 1-2% on fund deposits, plus 1-2% every year they hold investor money (7-years on average), plus fees for custodianship, admin and exit fees of up to 30%, the VC actually makes a living off fees and not successful exits.  In addition, VCs are rarely interested in early stage projects that require evolution and development and leave this early investing space to Angel investors and High Net Worth (HNW) individuals.  However, over the last 10 years or so, the number of Angels and HNW’s directly investing has plummeted due in part to the illiquidity of unsecured investing, the lack of understanding to carry out smart due diligence and the lack of visibility of good projects from a wide range of startups.  This is where the PIPE Platform and Lab to IPO Pathway is focused and our Web2 partner has built a robust set of tools to solve the issue relating to early stage investing that is set to improve returns for PGF members significantly AND provide liquidity via the PIPExchange (PEX) which is launching in Q4 2024.
Available to all
Built on public permissionless blockchains the PGF Launchpad Alpha is accessible to anyone anywhere in the world who has an internet connection and a compatible web3 wallet. Particularly those in the Global South for example in regions Like West Africa ,South Asia and Latin America where web3 adoption is high due to economic necessity since locations are still considered developing countries and lack the accessibility to cutting edge venture investments in the developed world.Â
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Multichain Support
The PGF Launchpad is a multi-chain dApp (decentralised application) that accepts the USDC stable coins available on 7 EVM (Ethereum Virtual Machine) blockchains including Arbitrum, BSC, Avalanche, Polygon, Base, Optimism and Ethereum coming soon. Offering native access to the overwhelming number of monthly active users in web3. Allowing you to save on bridging costs and associated security risks by investing in the Launchpad on your preferred network. With each network competing to improve scalability to reduce gas fees, our dApp’s chain optionality enables you to optimise your network usage costs so you can make your investments on the Launchpad as cost efficiently as possible.Â
Our non-zero sum approach multi-chain approach maximises the potential pool of web3Â investors for European university R&D. Significantly boosting funding for scientific research by drawing liquidity from multiple blockchain networks all utilising the EVM technology standard which is the most widely adopted in the blockchain industry by both developers and users.Â
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PGF Early Adopter Membership card NFT holders will be eligible to get a 20% fee discount NFT once there is $10 million TVL (total locked value) invested into the Launchpad on that specific chain. For example if you become a member on Arbitrum you will be eligible to free mint the fee 20% discount NFT on our upcoming Launchpad Beta product. To get your Early Adopter Membership card simply use the launchpad by investing any amount into the platform and you will automatically receive a SoulBound NFT card which is tied to your wallet forever. Then join our discord and open a support ticket to activate it by getting your PGF Early Adopter Role. This will also qualify you for an airdrop of our $gDAO governance token coming in 2024. So FOMO in before you miss out.
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Become a Pioneering Investor in the Next Potential Cutting Edge RWA Unicorns
No unicorn companies made it without risk takers and early adopters that could visualise the future how those innovations were going to disrupt the market and change the world. If you’re reading this you might think of yourself as a 2024 version of the type of person that would have invested in Apple or Microsoft back in the 80s with whatever you could afford. You could see that you would have made much much more than someone who invested a million dollars 20 years later in the 2000s simply because you were there early long before they became a unicorn and then later mega caps. This is where you now in 2024 in the web3 space and the early stage university impact projects on the Launchpad. The difference is unlike the 80s early 1980s Apple and Microsoft investors, you don’t have to wait for those projects to become publicly listed on the stock market to buy in. You can catch them much earlier on because we’ve given you public access to private equity through our PGF Launchpad from the safety of your web3 wallet without TradFi intermediaries or financial barriers to entry.Â
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Put quite simply, your investment in our web3 Launchpad has the unique PIPE Platform Pathway for RWA IP powering it success others don’t. That’s it!
So join us in the revolution to disrupt the European Paradox landscape and topple the VC dominated funding hierarchy holding back University R&D Innovations that could change the world with groundbreaking postive impact on society. Become a member today by making your first contribution to the PGF Launchpad Alpha!Â
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