Investment firm Vela Technologies has agreed to invest a further 拢200,000 in disruptive ticketing platform Vibe Tickets as part of a 拢750,000 follow-on funding round.
The latest fundraise brings total investment to date at the pre-revenue business to approximately 拢1.7m through a combination of crowdfunding, seed capital and private investment.
It will provide Vibe Tickets – which is also backed by tech entrepreneurs聽Scott Fletcher MBE and Matt Newing as well as Virgin聽founder聽Sir Richard Branson – with additional working capital to expand its offering into new verticals, build up its user base and add to its headcount.
It follows the recent opening of Vibe’s new London office and a string of new appointments who left the likes of Ticketmaster and Sky Tickets to join the business.
The newest recruits include Steph聽Maxwell聽and Daniel聽Gould聽as senior business development managers, and Chelsea聽Sargautis聽as senior social strategist.
Founder and managing director Luke Massie said: “Vibe has massive potential to completely transform the way people buy and sell live event tickets and share experiences with others. We’ve generated exponential growth over the last year both in terms of our user base and the size of our team, and our new London office is enabling us to recruit the brightest minds in the industry.
“Scott, Matt and Vela Technologies’ confidence in myself and the business has been reinforced by their recent investment and this will be used to accelerate the business at an even greater rate.
“I’m determined to see our offering further expand beyond tickets and increase our user base to over two million in the next two years. Our goal is to become the number one destination for live events for fans across the globe.”
Massie is now looking to raise over 拢2m from new investors in his second round of funding, which would value the business at over 拢10m.
The 24-year-old said conversations聽with global venture capitalists, early-stage tech funds and聽family offices are in the latter stages, with a number of offers already on the table.
Vibe聽Tickets allows real fans to buy and sell tickets but also make new like-minded friends at the biggest events. Since 2013, it has organically built a following of more than 70,000 users across eight countries.