4 Venture Capital firms in Europe to watch out for in 2021

By Joy Dumasia

Venture capital (VC) is a form of private equity and a type of financing that investors provide to startup companies and small businesses that are believed to have long-term growth potential. Venture capital generally comes from well-off investors, investment banks, and any other financial institutions. Venture capital is typically allocated to small companies with exceptional growth potential or to companies that have grown quickly and appear poised to continue to expand.

Venture capital financing is funding provided to companies and entrepreneurs. It can be provided at different stages of their evolution, although it often involves early and seed round funding. Venture capital is a subset of private equity (PE). While the roots of PE can be traced back to the 19th century, venture capital only developed as an industry after the Second World War.

The first step for any business looking for venture capital is submitting a business plan, either to a venture capital firm or an angel investor. If interested in the proposal, the firm or the investor must then perform due diligence, which includes a thorough investigation of the company’s business model, products, management, and operating history, among other things.

The following are the 4 Venture Capital firms in Europe to watch out for in 2021:

• Anthemis

Anthemis Group is a single investment corporation specializing in direct and secondary direct fundings in startups in the financial sphere. They invest money in both early-stage and late-stage ventures. The group has about four offices spread worldwide, out of which three are located in Europe themselves; the firm has been actively investing in small and medium-sized FinTech companies, especially those in their early stages in the US & UK.

IBS Intelligence reported that Weavr, a London-based startup that allows businesses to embed banking and payments into their mobile app or SaaS platforms, has closed a £7 million seed funding round led by Headline, with participation from a European seed-stage fund Seedcamp, Anthemis and FinTech-focused QED Investors.

• Balderton Capital 

Balderton Capital has invested more than $3 billion in 220 European startups over 20 years; Balderton is one of Europe’s leading early-stage venture capital investors, focused exclusively on European-founded technology companies. Balderton Capital is a flexible FinTech investor that fully supports its startups, assisting them with organizational questions, helping them adapt to the market, organizing joint events, etc. The most well-known organizations financed by Balderton Capital are Revolut, Cleo, Luno, and Nutmeg.

Recently, IBS Intelligence reported that Cobee, a European employee benefits management digital platform, has raised €14 million in Series A funding led by the leading European venture capital firm Balderton Capital. Invested also joined the round with previous investors SpeedInvest, Target Global, Encomenda and Lanai, and angels from Zalando, N26, Uber and Gympass.

• NFT Ventures 

NFT Ventures was established in Stockholm in 2014 to capture the opportunity to transform banking and financial services. NFT Ventures empower entrepreneurs and drive the FinTech disruption. Their portfolio being one of the largest when it comes to FinTech companies located in Europe. FinTech is the prime sector the venture capital firm invests in. 

It has already funded more than 46 startups in the Nordic region and the UK and has grown many technology projects. It supports startups in the seed phase, with offices in Stockholm, Helsinki and London; they are active across Northern European markets. The firm’s investors believe that the financial and banking sector will witness a similar technological disruption seen by airlines, media and mobile industries.

• Speedinvest 

Speedinvest is an Austrian VC firm established in 2011. Speedinvest works with first-time technical startups at the early fundraising stages. The firm supports projects connected with the FinTech industry and all its branches. Co-founded by Erik Bovee, Oliver Holle, Michael Schuster, Daniel Keiper-Knorr and Werner Zahnt, the investors have moved up the ladder in the past five years.

The firm has offices across Europe; they are heavily invested in debt collection, insurance, elder tech, innovating debit schemes and Amazon Web Services for financial services. Speedinvest has funded startups, including Actiondesk, Aircloak, and Cashpresso.

IBS Intelligence reported that UK business banking platform Tide had raised over $100 million in Series C funding at a valuation of $650 million. The Series C round was led by Apax Digital, the growth equity team of Apax Partners. Anthemis, Augmentum, Jigsaw, Local Globe / Latitude, SBI, and SpeedInvest, existing investors in the company, also participated in the round.

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