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Tuesday 2 May 2017

Hokkei liquidation shows fundamental flaws in system

 

Hokkei funded via Seedrs in the late Summer of 2015. By December 2015, the company had ceased trading and was in the hands of the administrators.


We wrote about them here. The final liquidation is now in place. However the amount raised by Seedrs  - claimed on their website as £319,580 appears in the Liquidators report as only £258,128. That's one hell of a commission Seedrs are taking out or they have been exaggerating their success numbers.

As usual the report can find nothing odd with a small one unit takeaway operation (already operating) burning up over £250k in cash in less than 6 months and ending up with overall debts of over £400k; a large chunk of this owed to trade creditors

Surely someone is taking the pea? 

In a final nose thumbing gesture, the ex director of Hokkei told the press at the start 2016 that he might well get the business back up and running again. That is precisely why the Insolvency Service takes away people's rights to be a company director. If we are going to make it easier for people to raise money then we do need to tighten up on the ability of the authorities to come down on those who abuse the system.

He is now back in  business - only cooking hoepfully!

It would also be good to know what happened to the missing £60k of investment from Seedrs?

Just had this from a SH - a note sent round to Hokkei investors from Seedrs. Clearly shows that their figure of £319k is fictional. Who can you trust??



6 comments:

  1. The amount raised on Seedrs (shown on their platform) doesn't always correspond to what actually lands in the bank account.

    They often allow external investment to count towards the "total" in that round. So the £60k is probably from another non seedrs investor who invested at the same time.

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  2. Or in other words they are making up their totals.

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  3. He already opened a place in bristol.
    https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/10279761/officers
    http://www.woky.co/

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  4. Crowdcube lend Crowdfunder some money! Seems odd given the former's lavish out goings each month...

    https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/07831511/filing-history

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  5. Hi Rob,
    When I raised on Seedrs I negotiated with them that any investors I brought to the raise (perhaps it was pre-existing shareholders, I forget now) would invest directly into the company and by doing so we could avoid paying Seedrs's fee. These amounts would show on the platform, consistent with Jon's experience. I can't remember whether Seedrs would check afterwards that we actually received the cash from this class of investors.

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    Replies
    1. Well you would have to question all of Seedrs figures is that was the case. Seems hard to believe that they do all the hard work but allow Co's to invite private investors off platform. Not a great way of making money!

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