Geronigo, a Leeds-based business working in the activity sector that plans to follow the success of aggregation apps like Delieveroo, Airbnb and Uber, is hoping to raise a six-figure investment through the Crowdcube platform to fund its global expansion plans.

The company is currently preparing a hard launch in the UK, offering a marketplace of 1,800 activity locations in the UK and Ireland, all of which can be booked through its website and app.

Bernie Janes, co-founder and chief executive of Geronigo, has worked in the action sports industry since 1998, initially founding the Go Ballistic team building and event management company before establishing a network of paintball sites across the UK.

Janes said: "That business became the largest operator in the UK by the early 2000s, with 90 per cent of the UK's population within 45 minutes of one of our sites. We started forming relationships with similar operators for the customers outside our areas, and from there moved into other adventures.

"We realised that the activity sector hasn't been aggregated in the same way that the likes of transport, food and dating have. It's quite difficult to do as the sector is quite fragmented and you have operators at different levels.

"We know how to do it and we've been doing it for some time. We now have just shy of 2,000 activity centres in the UK and Ireland."

The company’s crowdfunding campaign launched via the Crowdcube website earlier this week, with a target of £200,000 and a 20 per cent equity stake on offer to investors.

Following the creation of the company’s UK network, the funds will support the company's planned international expansion as they seek to replicate the success of aggregation apps such as Airbnb, Deliveroo and Uber.

Janes said: "We want to bring every adventure everywhere under our brand. From our Leeds office we want to go global. We've got the supply network sorted and now we need to move fast to take advantage.

"We're targeting the English speaking countries first. We'll be moving into Australia, New Zealand, the US and Canada in relatively quick succession. It's an international land grab as it were.

"The scale of that ambition is massive, but that's the nature of the business."

"We're not turning our back on the UK and will still be expanding, but as people are now approaching us here we need a less proactive approach."
Janes said crowdfunding brought benefits in comparison to traditional methods of funding.
"We had the option of traditional funding routes but we found with crowdfunding we could tie it in to our launch marketing" he said.

"It gives us exposure to more people and because it is easy to invest you get shareholders who become ambassadors for the business. You end up with a small army up and down the country. It strikes me as a very exciting and intelligent way of doing things."

Asked to sum up the motivation behind the business, Janes added: "Because life and your phone should be full of adventure."

Geronigo has so far raised excess of £190,000 from over 100 investors, with the campaign still live for 22 days.