In just three days! DAO raised over $13 million in token crowdsale

As an early Ethereum project investment fund, DAO raised more than $13 million worth of Ether in the first three days of its token crowdsale.

The DAO is a decentralized blockchain project fund management investment. In its initial stages, the DAO will work on projects related to the sharing economy and Internet of Things (IoT) blockchain applications, but the DAO said they are more interested in exploring other new markets that blockchain technology can unlock.

In a DAO project, participants have direct, real-time control over the funds they receive. Governing rules are formalized, automated, and enforced through the use of software. In this case, the DAO is Ethereum.

A number of DAO-like projects have also recently emerged, including DigixDAO, a decentralized organization built on the Ethereum platform. The project was founded by Singapore startup DigixGlobal Pte Ltd. DigixDAO completed its crowdsale in one day, raising $5.5 million in 14 hours.

DigixDAO is committed to working with the community to build and manage a 21st century gold standard financial platform on Ethereum. DigixDAO token holders can participate in Digix's process of building this gold payment system.

Likewise, there are no executives or boards in the DAO. Voting rights are granted to DAO token holders, who can vote for or against submitted proposals. Voting rights are proportional to the number of tokens held. Proposals are submitted to the DAO by contractors, who can clearly define the level of responsibility that DAO token holders bear for the operation of the DAO, meaning that the DAO is "outsourced" to contractors.

The DAO says they are looking for projects that can bring a return on investment or benefits to the organization and its members, thereby benefiting the entire decentralized ecosystem.

The DAO's revenue comes from the products and services it funds. The profits are then distributed to participants according to transparent rules that are decided in advance by the participants.

Current DAO Proposals

Slock.it has submitted its proposal for the development of the DAO Universal Sharing Network. The core part of the proposal is the Ethereum Computer, a multi-purpose device designed to decentralize the sharing economy.

Slock.it founder and former Ethereum CCO Stephan Tual said in a blog post:

“We chose The DAO as a suitable DAO to submit our proposal because it has the most developed community, has committed to deploying the latest code from the standard DAO framework, and has a very good governance signing mechanism.”

“We have been following DAO for some time and we know that this community is particularly passionate about the same goals and shared values, with a profound drive to improve the Internet of Things and sharing economy industries.”

The DAO relies on a team of managers nominated by DAO token holders to prevent 51% attacks by malicious actors.

The administrators are responsible for verifying that the contracts published on the Ethereum blockchain match the source code that the contractor claims to have deployed. They are also responsible for confirming that the proposals come from identified people or organizations.

Current managers include Ethereum experts such as Ethereum inventor and Ethereum Foundation founder Vitalik Buterin, former Ethereum CTO and co-founder Gavin Wood, and Christian Reitwießner, who implemented Ethereum’s smart contract language Solidity.

In addition to Slock.it, Mobotiq is expected to submit its project proposal shortly, which will focus on modular electric vehicles that can be rented in a peer-to-peer manner and integrate with Ethereum to develop fully autonomous and self-rental vehicles.

Tual expects to see “a lot of proposals” coming into the DAO.

“The DAO is an opportunity to support a large number of early Ethereum projects that could have a huge impact in the future.”