Total raised averaged per day over approximately 8.6 years from founding to bankruptcy or shutdown. This is not measured cash burn. Methodology
Funding: Computing/City AM
Current status
Administration (Feb 2016)
The rise & fall
6 moments · 2007–2016
The key moments.
2007
🌱
2007
Founded by Dan Wagner
The serial London entrepreneur sets out to build a mobile-commerce empire.
Wikipedia
2013
🦄
2013
A monster round mints a unicorn
Wellington Management leads a ~$76M investment, billed as one of the biggest first rounds a tech startup had ever raised.
FT
2015
📈
2015
The peak: a claimed $2.7B$2.7B
Wagner promotes PowaTag — scan an ad, buy instantly — and claims a valuation of about $2.7B.
FT
2015
2015
Burning cash in the Heron Tower
Lavish offices and heavy spending against thin revenue drain the ~$200M raised, while many of the trumpeted brand 'deals' are only non-binding letters of intent.
FT
Feb 2016
🪦
Feb 2016
Administration — joins the Unitard Club 💔
The cash runs out and administrators are called in; the $2.7B claim meets reality.
FT
2016
2016
Sold for scraps
The assets fetch a fraction of the $200M+ investors put in.
FT
$2.7Bof peak value erased · 9 years
How it happened
Powa Technologies, led by Dan Wagner, promoted its PowaTag mobile-payments product and claimed a valuation around $2.7B. Heavy spending against thin revenue drained its cash, and the company collapsed into administration in February 2016. Assets were sold off for a fraction of the capital raised.
