Crowdsourced Product Platform Quirky Quietly Raises $5 M.

Ben Popper — Tue, 10 May 2011 10:40:27 -0400

Without so much as a blog post, local start-up Quirky nearly doubled its venture backing, closing on a new $5 million round.

Quriky is part of a cadre of New York start-ups taking advantage of advances in 3D printing and the power of social networks to fuel crowdsourced funding.

Founder Ben Kaufman calls there approach social product development. Users pay $10 to submit ideas and awards influence points for contributing ideas and opinion on everything from engineering to branding.

User Matthew Flemming, for example, has earned $9,730 based on his contributions to 52 different products, including one idea he submitted that was selected for production.

Quirky gives back 30% of what each product's sale to the community based on the percentage of influence they earn.

Betabeat » Crowdsourced Product Platform Quirky Quietly Raises $5 M.

Crowdsourced Product Platform Quirky Quietly Raises $5 M.