Over the past few years, crowdfunding services like Kickstarter and Indiegogo have grown in popularity, enabling a number of unique projects to attract funding. Last year, Kickstarter alone helped rally more than two million people to pledge a total of $319,786,629 in funding. In all, 18,109 projects were funded on the site last year, including films, music recordings, and high-tech products. Instead of relying on choosy venture capitalists, entrepreneurs can market their idea directly to the general public.

One device that achieved success through crowdfunding is the Oculus Rift, a virtual-reality headset for gamers. The device features motion tracking, giving users a fully-immersive gaming experience. Since the Oculus Rift was invented by a teenager with few industry connections, it would have been difficult to secure financing through traditional means. However, Kickstarter allowed the Oculus Rift inventor to raise 2.4 million dollars from the general public. This funding was the followed by additional investment through traditional financial institutions. However, the Oculus Rift may have never gotten off the ground without the help of crowdfunding.

For entrepreneurs in the medical device realm, financing can be a significant challenge too. One company, B-a-MedFounder, hopes to change that.

"There are people in many different countries that have bright ideas, and they don't have the contacts in order to show them," stated Daniel Yachia, co-founder and CMO of crowdfunding startup B-a-MedFounder.

Yachia founded the novel crowdfunding platform with Sedat Barokas, his brother-in-law's son. Barokas has experience in both investment banking and private equity at the Turkven Private Equity group. In addition, Barokas has spent time at JPMorgan.

As of now, there are several medtech crowdfunding sites that cater to both entrepreneurs and investors. While HealthFundr and MedStartr both offer crowdfunding opportunities, both these companies focus on larger projects. However, B-a-MedFounder's main focus is on smaller medical devices.

"During the last year, I saw there are lots of problems in getting funding for new ideas," noted Yachia. "The source of funding for venture capital is almost dry for new entrepreneurs." He also added, "If I have a project and I got to a VC [venture capitalist], the minimum I need to ask for is $5 million, or they won't even look me in the face."

B-a-MedFounder plans to fund small-cap medical device companies with funding amounts ranging from $70,000 up to $100,000. For the most part, this is the amount of capital it takes to bring a medical device concept to a point where it looks attractive to traditional investors.

One of the benefits of B-a-MedFounder is that anyone can fund new medical device concepts in amounts as little as $10. However, these funds are not investments; they are donations that will eventually translate into equity for beneficent funders.

To list a project, entrepreneurs pay a listing fee of 100 euros (B-a-MedFounder is based in Cyprus). Before a listing is approved, the crowdfunding service will review the medical device concept to make sure it is viable.

Once 75% of a funding target has been reached, B-a-MedFounder will release funds to the investor. Each project has three months to reach its funding goal before being removed from the site. However, investors will have the opportunity to relist their medical device concept for another attempt at funding.