Elite Dangerous Funding

[HaiderGill]

I am wondering why people buy the expensive options for when they want to supporting Elite Dangerous development? Why don't people just buy Frontier stock? It is the job of shareholders to fund a company. If Frontier and their shareholders can't fund it then may they should sell stock in the project ED. Then I will stump up for more than my Federal Trader purchase. I have bought the game and paid upfront waving any interest charges. If the scheme goes belly up I will lose my £37 that's my risk. If it all works out I get to play Elite Dangerous that's my reward. If the shareholders do not put their hand in their pocket and fund the development of ED why should they take all the profit without all the risk. Why are people spending £150 buying founding member pledge and not stock? I cannot comprehend this could someone please explain? Being a stock owner you have a voice. I would love it if we could say 60% of the profit of ED must go back into it for development, maintenance and support.

May be we should set-up an Elite Supporters Trust where we can all club together and buy Frontier stock? As a stockholder the trust would also have a voice and could back Elite Dangerous to the hilt. There is already a model in the Arsenal Supporters Trust http://www.arsenaltrust.org/about/introducing-the-ast

 

[jabokai]

You don't get anything in the game for buying stock and people spending those sums obviously want that stuff.

 

[psykokow]

cost and administration make share selling less attractive than a kickstarter where you can essentially sell nothing.. and have people happy to buy it.

IF we play the 'pedantic' card there....

BUT we're not backing Frontier so to say we are ring fencing funding to go into Elite Dangerous to get the game we all want.

Businesswise selling shares is a complication, kickstarters are very simple.. hence why the kickstarters will be abused and ways for businesses to bypass proper funding..

 

[Slawkenbergius]

You're not funding the game by buying stock... The IPO money is already in Frontier's account, and all you'd be doing is putting money into the pockets of whoever owns the shares currently. From what little I know of business, even if we manage to push the share prices up, Frontier still don't get any more money unless they release new shares.

That said, the shares look oversold, so now might be a good time to invest if you're an investor. I don't have the money to gamble, so all mine is staying put in savings accounts.

 

[Sir.Tj]

Frontier was a limited company it was only floated after the Kickstarte had ended so in theory there were no stocks to buy by the general public at the very least.

But there was a general desire to see a new version of Elite. pure and simple, those who wanted to see the game made backed it to how much they could afford. With the additional rewards for the higher levels as a bonus for many, the writers had again the desire to add to the Elite universe in a way they believe they could do justice.

The second I saw it was announced I was over to the KS page and hitting the submit button.

I'd be interested to see if you could see what number you were in the pledge order.

 

[izzy]

Agree wiyh Psykokow and Jakobai. We have paid for Elite. FD will use all the money from KS and Paypal to make the game as they (DB) want
FD has many other game not only Elite

 

[psykokow]

And what TJ said too SMart cookie him... always watching the timelines... like a Timecop!

 

[Jenner]

I'm happy to have funded the game as I've done, not in acquiring stock. It's ED I'm interested in, not being an investor in some game company. And why do people pour lots more money into projects like this than needed to get a copy of the game? To support the project, of course, and to get backer rewards. Both of which you do not get by becoming an investor in the traditional sense.

You become an investor to get a return on your investment.
You become a project backer to get an awesome product.

 

[HaiderGill]

You're not funding the game by buying stock... The IPO money is already in Frontier's account, and all you'd be doing is putting money into the pockets of whoever owns the shares currently. From what little I know of business, even if we manage to push the share prices up, Frontier still don't get any more money unless they release new shares.

That said, the shares look oversold, so now might be a good time to invest if you're an investor. I don't have the money to gamble, so all mine is staying put in savings accounts.

Share price goes up, company worth more, means more can be borrowed to invest.

 

[deusx_ophc]

You become an investor to get a return on your investment.
You become a project backer to get an awesome product.

that is the simple answer right there. stock ownership has nothing to do with elite dangerous.

fd used the relatively buoyant aim (first time in +% figures since credit crunch) to generate the cash they need to execute/support their growth plans. they have been busy on quite a few fronts...

 

[HaiderGill]

Frontier was a limited company it was only floated after the Kickstarte had ended so in theory there were no stocks to buy by the general public at the very least.

But there was a general desire to see a new version of Elite. pure and simple, those who wanted to see the game made backed it to how much they could afford. With the additional rewards for the higher levels as a bonus for many, the writers had again the desire to add to the Elite universe in a way they believe they could do justice.

The second I saw it was announced I was over to the KS page and hitting the submit button.

I'd be interested to see if you could see what number you were in the pledge order.

I'm not out to get Frontier and neither do I have an agenda. I want to see ED as much as the next man. Hence my upfront backing to what I can afford. My time-frame was pretty much soon as I heard. I heard of SC and then I thought of Elite; googled and found they were making another one. I may be able to buy a 100 shares in Frontier as my commitment - from crimble presents. It's not an investment. Shareholders have a voice that could protect DB and ED in the future. When you're a shareholder you can voice your opinion and enough of you club together you can make sure the big corporate investors can't just call the shots. If I had won the lottery then I would hoover up all the stock and say DB if you need more money for ED let me know. As share prices rises a company debt to value improves and this results in all sort of wonderful things like lower borrowing costs, shareholders listen to the CEO etc...

There were always shareholders just the shares were not quoted on public exchanges AIM, Icap Securities and Derivatives Exchange etc...

As far as raising funds you would do a rights issue to raise additional funding. Essentially that is what the UK government did on our behalf with the banking sector. Obviously the bigger % of share that goes into 'public hands' more the likely a takeover can occur. This came up at Arsenal Trust with certain members suggesting a rights issue to raise funding for investment in the first team playing staff as the building of the new stadium left a very small budget. Unfortunately there was the a back-drop of a takeover battle which meant it was not possible.

 

[Sir.Tj]

And what TJ said too SMart cookie him... always watching the timelines... like a Timecop!

Aww shucks.

FD also had some major investment from outside the KS and IPO which hopefully puts them in a very solid financial position. with so many game companies gone over the years it's testament to FD and David B just how good a comany they are and how investable they are. Of course with a share option avaliable there will always be a possibility of a takeover, thats something that I couldn't predict. (unless I win the lottery of course. )

I'd say that the Kickstarter was hugely important for FD, primarily to see how much interest was out there for a new addition to the series. The forum was a prety quiet place before the KS so the KS was the perfect way to guage opinion. They do however have a few other irons in the fire. Zoo Tycoon being a prime example, I'd say it's a mark of the quality of FD's work that it was used as a launch title for the Xbone.

The fact that the game has exceeded the KS target with more backers coming on everyday proves that the game was crying out to be made and the level of some of the pledges confirm that. Every single pledge was as important as the other though,all the £5/£10 etc. pledges all add up to a large amount.

 

[Slawkenbergius]

Share price goes up, company worth more, means more can be borrowed to invest.

Frontier got the money they wanted, so unless something goes horribly wrong, they should be good without borrowing. Certainly I doubt they will go beyond the arrangements they already have in place. Yes, it will be good for everyone when the share price rises, but it's probably not something they're highly concerned with. The idea of us backers pushing up the share price by becoming traders is silly, as we'd immediately lose around £7.50 per transaction in admin fees and would have monthly fees on top of that, for an increase of a fraction of a penny on the share. Better just to pledge £10 and be done with it.

Say I bought £300 of shares near when they appeared for sale and were going for around 157p. I would have lost:

• £7.50 admin fee on the trade
• £1.50 a month admin fees, totalling £18
• Around £94 in share depreciation

So I personally would have lost about £120, and meanwhile not really done anything towards making the game happen. Which is why I pledged rather than invested.

Of course shares in FDEV should hopefully rise long-term, so it's all good if you have money and an existing portfolio.

 

[HaiderGill]

ED and The Arsenal are a passion and not an investment. I just want to make sure some tyke shareholders don't come in expecting dividend, profits dumb it down for bigger console market-share and American voices for the Hollywood effect.

 

[Slawkenbergius]

ED and The Arsenal are a passion and not an investment. I just want to make sure some tyke shareholders don't come in expecting dividend, profits dumb it down for bigger console market-share and American voices for the Hollywood effect.

I doubt that you'd get much say in that, and there's probably not much to worry about in the first place. Frontier still hold the lion's share of the stock, with 56.4% going to DB and 6.6% shared amongst the other directors. The next biggest shareholder is Chris Sawyer at 8.3%, who probably owns the stock through previous association with Frontier. His history as an independent game designer shows that he's not really the corporate type.

The biggest 'threat' of interfering are are a couple of investment firms owning 10% combined (most likely the pre-IPO private investors people seem to think are a secret, perhaps along with Andrew Cummings). I doubt they'd really want to get involved with game design though.

Even if the backers wanted to make a difference for some altruistic reason, there's really not enough shares going round, or people who are going to buy those shares, to make a difference. In my opinion... That said, most of my business knowledge comes second-hand from my dad, so I might well be missing something.

 

[Sir.Tj]

ED and The Arsenal are a passion and not an investment. I just want to make sure some tyke shareholders don't come in expecting dividend, profits dumb it down for bigger console market-share and American voices for the Hollywood effect.

Ed and Norwich City are a passion for me...Luckily at least ED's doing well....

 

[Patrick_68000]

Unable to get free updates with a stock

 

[Sparticus]

I am wondering why people buy the expensive options for when they want to supporting Elite Dangerous development?

My Simple Answer - because I can

 

[Keeval]

My Simple Answer - because I can

Ditto - plus I wanted to support the kickstarter and help get the game made... plus the extra in game stuff is cool as well

 

[huwthomas]

Even setting the value of owning and playing the game aside, it won't take very many updates, even if they're priced quite cheaply, to amount to a very respectable return on an £80 investment. A far better yield than you could reasonably expect from shares