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Sunday CET #4

Oct 20, 2019

This is the fourth edition of Sunday CET, a weekly curation of what we found interesting in the European investment tech landscape.

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1. More money in the market
2. How others are doing it
3. Interesting bets
4. Data, research, observations
5. What others think

1. More money in the market

🇬🇧 Permira closes Permira VII at €11 billion

Permira is an European private equity firm headquartered in London. It was founded in 1985 and operated under the Schroder Ventures brand until 2001 when it changed the name to Permira.

Since founding, Permira has about €30bn assets under management, having made nearly two private equity hundred deals - buyouts and growth investments.

The latest fund, Permira VII, just had its final closing with total commitments of €11bn and is looking to invest across Technology, Consumer, Financial services, Healthcare, Industrial Tech and Services.

🇫🇷 Idinvest Closes Digital Fund III, at €350 million

Idinvest Partners is an European mid-market private equity and venture capital firm based in Paris. It was founded under the name AGF Private Equity, S.A in 1997, and operated as part of Allianz until 2010, then became independent.

In January 2018, the firm became a subsidiary of Eurazeo, a global investment company, with a diversified portfolio of €17.7bn in assets under management, including nearly €11.6bn from investment partners, invested in nearly 400 companies.

Idinvest Partners has €8bn under management with more 4000 deals made with small and medium-sized European enterprises at various stages of growth.

The new fund, Idinvest Digital Fund III, was closed at €350M, out of which €85m has already been invested across 15 businesses.

🇫🇷 Sofinnova Partners Closes Early-Stage Healthcare Fund, at €333 million

Sofinnova Partners is a venture capital firm headquartered in Paris that has its roots in 1972. In 1997, the global Sofinnova organization restructured into two independent entities - Sofinnova Ventures in the US and Sofinnova Partners in Europe.

Sofinnova Partners invests in early stage companies and corporate spin-offs, in clean technology and life science and has approximately €2 billion of capital in AuM.

The latest fund, Sofinnova Capital IX, is an early-stage healthcare venture capital fund which was oversubscribed and closed at €333 million.

🇬🇧 Hiro Capital launches a €100 million VC fund to invest in Games, Esports and Sports technology

The fund will back deep technology entrepreneurs and creative studios in Games, Esports and Digital Sports and in sector-specific applications of Cloud, Mobile, Streaming, Big Data, AI, Wearables, AR and VR technologies.

Hiro Capital, managed by Luke Alvarez, is London-based and will generally invest at the post-seed stage, at Series A and B.

🇪🇸 JME Venture announced its third fund at €60 million, opens office in Barcelona.

JME Venture Capital, based in Madrid, is an early-stage venture investment fund founded by Javier Alarcó (acting CEO) and José Manuel Entrecanales.

The investments focus is late seed and series A in Spanish companies, or founded by Spaniards, tech-based and showing clear traction signals.

The new fund, expected to close in early 2020 at €60 million, aims to invest in about 30 startups over the next five years, with a first ticket of between € 500,000 and € 3 million per project, and the possibility of extending that amount to € 6 million in followup rounds.

🇪🇸 Ged Capital launched Conexo Ventures, a Spanish VC fund with a target size of €40 million.

Conexo Ventures has already commitments of €20 million and aims to contribute to series A rounds in Iberia-based startups developing disruptive software with scalable business models. The money will be invested in around 20 operations, of which around 50% will be follow-up investments.

Conexo, managed by the partners Joaquim Hierro, Isaac de la Peña and Damien Balsan, has already been part of investments made in BNext, Buguroo and Kushki.

GED Capital is an independent investment manager founded in 1996 that operates in the middle market segment with about € 900 million in AuM.

2. How others are doing it

🇩🇪 German entrepreneurs call for €5bn government startup fund

Entrepreneur and investor Frank Thelen is calling for the German government to launch a scale-up investment fund similar to the €5bn fund announced by France last month.

🇫🇷 Car sharing continues to develop in Paris despite a complex, fragmented offer

In Paris, on average people rent cars for 50 minutes, of which 20 is spent looking for parking.

🇬🇧 PitchBook announced the appointment of Brett Kaluza as Managing Director of its European Headquarters in London

This is part of PitchBook’s efforts to consolidate its presence in Europe, as it is looking to bolster coverage of European company valuations, financing rounds, investors, funds and returns and fund commitments.

As such, PitchBook expects to increase its workforce by 50% by the end of 2020, accommodated in a new office, Saffron House

Brett Kaluza has been with the firm since 2011, when he started working as a research associate in Seattle.

🇬🇧 What are we looking for in our next partner?

The first requirement is that you need to be able to demonstrate some kind of investment track record. This could certainly be in another VC firm, but equally it could be as an angel. What we’re looking for is someone who has been able to demonstrate that they’re a conviction-led investor at Series A or seed stage. You need to be able to meet a founder and pull the trigger, based on very little empirical data.

🇬🇧 How They Raised Series A: Signal AI

Signal is a software platform for media monitoring and reputation management based in London.

They raised their Series A round in December 2016 - It took two to three months to prepare and negotiate the term sheet — covering funding, corporate governance, and liquidation. Followed by two months to finalise the documents.

🇩🇪 PropTech1 is setting up shop in London

The London office will serve as the homebase for PropTech1’s expansion in the UK, led by senior associate Jan Gierkes.

According to their own statement, PropTech1 is “the optimal VC for British PropTech startups planning to enter mainland Europe”. The firm is operated from Berlin and London is its first office outside of the German-speaking region of Europe.

🇻🇦 Pay to pray

Vatican launches $110 'click to pray' wearable rosary. The device is designed to teach young people about the Catholic faith.

🇪🇺 The business of online media in a 1:52 min. video, the Guardian edition