As a venture capital backed company it is highly unlikely that Quora could possibly ever consider tokenization. Not unless, first, they would convince the board of directors to dilute their holdings or alternatively buy back all shares.
Many companies in a later stage of evolution, and thus finances, have not always sufficient shares available to raise more funds and need to create new shares. This can only be approved by the Board of Directors, many of which also are often larger shareholders.
The biggest question to be asked here is “How much shares, thus tokens, could Quora issue and at what price, in order to satisfy its existing investors?”.
That would be one of the largest ICOs yet because Quora is currently valued at $1.8bn. Obviously, that valuation is what existing investors would expect to see in the ICO - and preferably even more - in order to be satisfied with the operation. Yet, at that point they enter a volatile market, a market which so far hasn’t yet proven any genuine valuation mechanics beyond BTC dominance.
If you look round you will note that many investors do not invest in tokens, but in teams. They invest in a company, and that company may hold tokens (which may even be defined in the term sheet) but the more traditional - and larger investors - will not invest by buying tokens. Instead they will give the company money to grow and scale. So-called runway.
The cryptomarket is still too volatile and unregulated for investors to touch it, especially considerations that most venture capital funds are not the money of the investors themselves. More of than not they are managers of funds, funds provided by backers. Many funds on Sandhill Road are backed by for example the country of Norway as well as private rich people and also hedge fund managers, who back the VC funds with funds they manage.
Would Musing still thrive?
It’s slightly too early to say that because Musing is too young and while it already has momentum it’s definitely not yet at the level of “thriving”.