Blockchain surveillance startup Faceter claims to raise $10m in 20 seconds

In what could be South Africa’s fastest and most successful token presale, Johannesburg-based blockchain surveillance startup Faceter claims it raised over US$10-million in 20 seconds during a sale held on Monday.

Speaking in a video posted on the company’s Twitter account yesterday, Faceter CEO and co-founder Robert Pothier announced the outcome of the presale and added that he “believed in the project being spread around the world”.

The token presale was conducted on a whitelist basis, after a process that saw over 8 000 applicants from 152 countries apply to take part in the presale, the company claimed.

Faceter develops smart video surveillance solutions with enhanced face detection, object detection and real-time video analysis capabilities. The startup, which was founded in 2014, does this through blockchain and machine learning technology.

Faceter will now launch an ICO next week Thursday (15 February)

A whitepaper on Faceter’s site states that the company had allocated 108 000 000 FACE tokens for sale in a presale that was to be held between Monday (5 February) and 15 February.

One FACE token is equivalent to US$0.1.

However, Faceter claims the presale surpassed the initial target of 108 ooo ooo by selling 116 245 226 FACE tokens, effectively raising about US$11 624 522 by our calculations.

Faceter now plans to launch a 15 day ICO of 300 000 000 FACE tokens next week Thursday (15 February). The proceeds of the sale will be used to cover research and development as well as outreach partnerships and integration costs, among other plans.

Pothier shared moments from the historical token presale in the video below: