How to Evaluate ICOs?

It’s not a secret that an initial coin offering is one of the hottest topics nowadays. Raising millions of dollars, it enables the launch of innovative startups and provides the opportunity for investors to make a decent profit. The most frequently-asked questions are either how to launch an ICO and gain glory/money, or how to invest and earn a fortune! It is crucial to know which projects to invest in. Hence, it is essential to evaluate them, analyze possible risks, and examine business-plan credibility.

We have researched the foremost ICO deals of 2018. To outline the best of the best, we chose projects that meet the following criteria:

have a positive investment rating

have a very low or low risk score

have well-developed marketing and social-media management strategies

possess technical development characteristics surpassing all others

have a highly-qualified team professionals on board

ICO launches that meet the above-mentioned requirements easily raise large amounts of money for further development.

According to ICORating, the following graph for collected funds and completed projects is provided below:

Statistics of successfully completed projects and raised funds 2018

Major industries according to the research conducted are as follows:

Major industries of successful ICOs

TOP 10 ICOs of 2018

Let’s dive in and investigate the TOP 10 ICOs of 2018. The research is based upon the data provided by ICORating and ICObench, 5 being the highest score. Please be aware that unlike others, the lower the risk score, the better it is!

WePower ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 4.2 (very high) Risk score: 1.8 (very low) Technical characteristics: 4.9 (great) Team: 4.4 (good)

Based on the blockchain, the WePower platform aims to find solutions to relevant issues of funds access for energy developers and also direct investment access for final consumers. Speed and transparency in energy trading is a priority, as well. Company tokens can be used for long-term investments as well as for earning purposes. The ICO especially benefits from a very low risk score and boasts a well-developed ICO profile as well as of strong, professional team. The campaign has successfully raised $40 million.

The team has been busy, and development work is going according to schedule: the first platform will be released in April, and energy auctions are planned for November. The business plan is meeting its milestones according to plan indifferent countries.

Arturas Asakavicius,Co-Founder of WePower, comments on the latest updates:

“Within the last weeks, we have established relationships with the EU Commission. The commissioner responsible for energy markets invited us to meet in Brussels. We are proud and excited to admit that the feedback we’ve received on WePower’s solution from this high institution was very positive. We are looking forward to working together on future energy market regulation in the EU.”

Solve.Care ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 4.1 (very high) Risk score: 2.2 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.6 (great) Team: 4.1 (good)

Rated as the top healthcare platform on blockchain by icoSource, Solve.Care aims to decentralize and improve healthcare administration with the help of blockchain implementation. Its goal is to ameliorate the care outcome with the help of effective coordination and cost/inefficiency elimination.

The investment rating is positive: CryptoDayTrader rated Solve.Care as the top 2018 token sale worth investing in. Upgraded anti-fraud and anti-abuse technologies provide a low possibility of risk. In addition, the ICO profile meets all technical requirements, and is highly rated by experts. The hype score is very high, as well: social media communication is provided on numerous channels, such as Bitcointalk, Twitter, Github, Facebook, and Reddit. In addition, Solve.Care is quick at responding, which proves how important it is for them to keep clients updated.

The campaign ended on April 30. As of today, the team has been working on extending client partnerships, progressing on the token sale, and CAN transaction auditing. Here is how Solve.Care CEO Pradeep Goel comments on the progress:

“We expect to announce the next client partnership in May, subject to contract negotiation period. And we are just getting warmed up: we have an incredible pipeline of prospects in the U.S., Canada, and the Middle East, comprised of medium to very large healthcare organizations taking a close look at our platform. We are continuing to make good progress on the token sale. We have approximately 75 million tokens left, and are talking to several large VC and client-managed investment funds. We are expecting to close the gap before the sale ends. Whatever is not sold will be burned. As you all know, we are an SEC-compliant sale, and we are very keen to follow all norms and best practices. We are following the best practice of auditing all token-sale transactions, including but not limited to compliance, AML, and verification.”

Truegame ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 2.9 (high) Risk score: 2.4 (low) Technical characteristics: 5.0 (great) Team: 4.8 (great)

This top-rated project by ICObench boasts an outstanding profile and a great team! Based on blockchain, this iGambling platform is intended for anyone interested in the casino industry. Truegame offers various types of games and a billing system. It is also possible to use the shopping cart: one can purchase online tickets (considered as goods) with company tokens. TGAME tokens, based upon the ERC20 standard, allow customers to process payments, pay debts or commissions, and accumulate funds within the system.

The platform has a number of advantages, such as full-compliance technical development, high social activity, and a low risk score. Team representatives have obtained all the necessary skills to increase project efficiency and attract investments.

Liudmila Varavina, Head of Communications at Truegame, comments on its current progress:

“As our token sale is coming to an end, we are finalizing its results, negotiating with a wide range of exchanges and creating bonuses for token sale participants. At the same time, we are getting our RNG certified, being in the process of obtaining a gaming license and constantly creating new smart-contract-based games. After the ICO is completed, we will dive deeply into gaming platform development and start an active marketing campaign of attracting players to the platform”.

Play2Live ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 3.5 (high) Risk score: 2.7 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.8 (great) Team: 4.6 (great)

Play2Live is one more successfully-launched ICO. Meeting the technical requirements and offering a low risk score, it has managed to raise $30,000,000. Launched in the gaming and VR industry, the platform focuses on streaming services, content, and practical-needs generation for gamers. Team industry professionals have developed a thorough business plan and documentation. Product functionality is rated maximum by experts, as it allows the development of a user-controlled reward system.

Maria Mavrekh, CMO at Play2Live, comments on current progress and priorities:

“The Play2Live project’s priorities are the listing of Level Up Coin (LUC) tokens on cryptocurrency exchanges in the near future, as well as the launch of the beta version of the p2l.tv platform during the summer of 2018. Moreover, there is some news about interesting partnerships coming soon.”

StopTheFakes ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 3.5 (high) Risk score: 2.7 (low) Technical characteristics: 5.0 (great) Team: 4.3 (good)

With outstanding technical characteristics, very high social activity, and a low risk score, StopTheFakes is designed to detect intellectual property infringements. Based upon a decentralized platform, it spots property violations of rights in such spheres as manufacture and brand/film/music and patent ownership. The service plan is also to implement Big Data analysis to functionally eliminate IP violations. Purchasing the utility token enables full software and data access as well as later sale or exchange for another cryptocurrency.

StopTheFakes.io provides the following information on updates:

“As of now, our Token Sale can be considered closed, meaning that the results are final. Some additional comments will be published later. We’d like to thank once again all those who were with us in these days, lending their moral support and taking part in project funding.”

Cappasity ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 3.1 (high) Risk score: 2.0 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.5 (very good) Team: 4.1 (good)

This is a decentralized platform in the gaming and VR industry designed for creating, renting, and selling 3D content. The project idea is promising, and has long-term goals to spread AR/VR technologies worldwide. Technical compliance has been fully met. In addition, all documentation is well-structured, providing clear argumentation and explanation. The team members have great experience in a wide variety of fields. With a very low risk score, the Cappasity ICO should be very much in demand in the near future. In addition, Cappasity has conducted an active social campaign using numerous communications channels. The ICO has raised $2,301,451.

Cappasity CEO Kosta Popov mentions the following updates on his Medium channel:

“Cappasity Becomes a Sponsor of eTail Germany 2018 and Showcases 3D Digitizing Technology to European Retailers. We strive to develop our platform as quickly as possible, and we can occasionally use partner solutions instead of writing them ourselves. We may change our tasks’ priorities depending on what our business development team is currently working on. For example, we have added the Internal Exchange feature to our roadmap, and we are going to release Cappasity.AI ahead of the scheduled time. In the same way, we are going to support SAP Hybris and Salesforce, which were originally missing, but now are necessary for the successful expansion of the platform.”

XYO Network ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 3.3 (high) Risk score: 2.5 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.6 (great) Team: 4.2 (good)

XYO Network is a blockchain-based technology with a proof-of-crypto-location oracle network. Due to primary components (Sentinels, Bridges, Archivists, and Diviners), digital signatures, and access to a protocol of connected devices, it is possible to ensure data validity and certainty of location. Highly rated for its technical characteristics, the project has already developed an advanced hardware network (Bluetooth and GPS), which is crucial for operating the geolocation data. The ICO boasts a highly professional team of 20+ experts and a low risk score. The campaign ends on May 21.

The company has recently strengthened their crypto-location technical portfolio with GEO acquisition. Markus Levin, XYO Network Co-Founder, comments:

“We’re excited about the addition of GEO to our crypto-location portfolio. GEO adds an additional feature set to XYO by trustlessly notifying a device that an object was there with absolute certainty, and without having to communicate private data with the network. We immediately recognized the added value of GEO to XYO because it advances the concept of secure, private and anonymous location verification.”

AppCoins ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 2.9 (high) Risk score: 2.5 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.5 (very good) Team: 4.1 (good)

AppCoins is a cryptocurrency intended to facilitate safer transactions within app store flows. The network is an open Ethereum-based protocol that uses the ERC20 standard. It aims to provide better efficiency, value, and incentives to supporters of the mobile market industry. The project is technically complex, but well-structured. Documentation provided by the developers highlights all nuances of project implementation. Team members are responsible, and have qualifications and knowledge of sphere specifics. Social activity is high, as well, to keep the customers and investors updated. With its low risk score, this ICO promises to optimize business strategy. The amount of raised funds is $15,300,000.

The AppCoins official team informs:

“The last two weeks have been spent preparing everything for the Alpha 3 release on the 2nd of May. This major release will include one of the biggest flows of the AppCoins Protocol: the Advertising use case. As we’ve explained in previous articles, this functionality enables users to earn APPC from using apps with associated advertising campaigns. The next steps for the Alpha 3 release include a redesign of the Transactions screen, as well as improving navigation through the app. It will enable users to better understand transactions done through the Wallet, since users will be able to not only make normal ‘send tokens’ transactions, but also transactions regarding in-app purchases and earning coins from apps.”

Aid Coin ICO

Investment rating: positive Marketing and social activity: 3.2 (high) Risk score: 2.5 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.5 (very good) Team: 3.4 (good)

Launched in the social services and non-profit industry, this project offers an AID token to the community for performing transparent donations and providing access to the AIDPay services network. Developed by the CharityStars fundraising platform, AidCoin establishes communication with charity banks to track donated-funds distribution. The technical part of the ICO is highly rated by experts. In addition, AidCoin has proven to be more transparent than similar projects in the market. With its low risk score, investors were interested in purchasing company tokens, which caused a strong token demand. As a result, the ICO achieved its hard cap three days before the crowdfunding end, eventually raising $15,854,305.

The AidChain Beta was officially released on April 6. The announcement is as follows:

“This is just the first preview of what AIDChain is going to be, and it only has basic functionality, but this is already an important step toward transforming the nonprofit sector. Now that we’ve launched the Beta, we can’t wait to start raising donations through it. And the first step in this regard is launching particular fundraising campaigns, as that’s where the current tracking features of AIDChain can best be applied.”

DreamTeam ICO

Investment rating: stable+ Marketing and social activity: 1.7 (low) Risk score: 1.7 (low) Technical characteristics: 4.3 (good) Team: 4.2 (good)

DreamTeam ICO is a new eSports and gaming platform used for network management and recruitment purposes. Though the investment rating isn’t positive, but stable+, this is not a disadvantage. The risk score is very low, which provides safety and transparency within the blockchain ecosystem. The ICO profile and its technical characteristics are rated 4.3, which is a good result. The company’s team enumerates various field professionals with years of experience. The DreamTeam platform is based on blockchain and smart contracts to provide highly secure transactions. A set of tools is offered for employee management, coaching, and analytical analysis. Developed media tools enable players to analyze, collect, and create media data.

The ICO is active until May 19. Dream Team Media informs:

“The final token sale has started! On April 18th, team management announced a decrease of the project’s total Token Sale hard cap from $45 million to $21 million, due to the recent investment by Mangrove Capital Partners, a major European venture capital firm.”

So don’t lose your chance to get more information about the ICO! You’ve still got plenty of time.