Amsterdam-based Rockstart is a global accelerator-VC that supports purpose-driven founders across three domains, including Energy, AgriFood and Emerging Tech. The VC recently celebrated its decade-long presence in the market.
“It seems like yesterday when we set out to build, what we referred to at the time, the world’s greatest startup machine. Back then we were driven by creating new, innovative technologies which enhanced the growth of companies and their people. We were focused on building scalable businesses, international companies which one day would be leaders of their industries,” says the company in a blog post.
In order to better understand the journey of Rockstart, key milestones, challenges, vision and future plans, we caught up with Rune Theill, CEO & Co-Founder of Rockstart.
The journey that started 10 years ago
Rockstart was created by Oscar Kneppers, who was later joined by Don Ritzen, Koen Wagemakers, and Rune Theill.
“Oscar and Koen knew each other from Oscar’s previous company and Don and Rune only just met months before and decided to team up. As a quartet, we honestly did not know each other that well,” reminisces Theill.
“The idea of Rockstart was originally to provide rock-solid support to startups for the first 1000 days because 10 years ago it was almost impossible to launch a new business: there were hardly any investors or corporates willing to invest or work with new technology. In this initial phase, when there are a lot of risks and unknowns, startups need support from a professional partner to lead them to the next level – we wanted to be that partner,” he says.
A “rocky start”
According to Theill, Rockstart’s start was probably more rocky than most companies. They made many of the mistakes that they tell their startups not to make: premature scaling, implementing the wrong organisational structure (e.g holacracy), hiring too fast and firing too slow, not making clear enough contracts to avoid discussions later.
“On a personal level, I must admit that I was a quite inexperienced CEO for the kind of complex company Rockstart was back in 2016. Let’s just say, we had five years of success and five years of being a bit rocky :),”
The Office: From 20m2 to 2700m2
According to Theill, their first office on Rokin 75, in Amsterdam, was just 20㎡ and served more like an ideation office with posters and print-outs on the walls. “These were very humble beginnings,” he remarks. “From there we went from 300m2 to 900m2 back to 150m2 to 2000m2 and ended with a space of 2700m2 on Rigakade 10. In 2020 we went fully remote-first as we learned that the value is not in the bricks, but in the ecosystem.”
Raising two new funds in Emerging Technologies
Earlier this month, the company announced that Dutch energy company Eneco has invested €3.75M in its Energy fund. The Rockstart Energy fund was launched in 2020 to help the startups that drive the energy transition forward.
Rockstart’s €22M+ Energy VC fund was backed by institutional investors, European family offices, informal investors, and the government.
After setting up in the last quarter of 2020, the Energy Fund has already invested in 12 startups. These include Klimate, Technology Catalogue, Fibersail, Advanced Infrastructure, Bia, eDRV, Helio, Okto, Soolutions, Starke, Lanterne, and Sympheny.
Earlier this year, in May, Rockstart announced the closing of its AgriFood fund at €22m with the participation of Vaekstfonden’s Green Future Fund, alongside new informal investors such as Joke Pronk and longtime Rockstart investors, Marcel Beemsterboer, Jasper de Rooij, Hans Maltha and, new investor global dairy cooperative Arla Foods.
Rockstart has also recently announced that it is raising two new funds in Emerging Technologies. “Emerging technologies is a well-known theme to Rockstart as this was our focus when we first started out. We looked for superstar founding teams building proprietary and game-changing technology products. At that very beginning, we found companies like Wercker, iClinic, Hubs, Peerby and Gibbon- just to mention a few. Today, we will look for the next generation of technology businesses which will have an impact in five to ten years from now,” says Theill.
“10 years in, we are only 1 per cent there”
Talking about the company’s plan for next year, Theill says Rockstart will reach €100m under management in 2022.
“Together with hundreds of investors and mentors we have set out to empower founders to build value of $100bn as only then we know that our positive impact has truly made a difference on a global scale. Today we are 1 per cent of the way.”
When asked about their deadline for reaching 100 per cent by hitting the $100B mark, Theill response was, “It’s far-fetched to talk about a specific deadline. What we can say is that the ambition is bigger than ever and that we are committed to partaking in funding the transformation to a regenerative and sustainable future. Although it seems far away, we believe that we are perfectly positioned to make this happen at a much faster pace than we did during the first ten years.”
Milestones & memories
Sharing some of his most memorable memories during Rockstart’s journey, Theill says, “From a business perspective probably the acquisition of Wercker to Oracle in 2016 – this was our first major exit and therefore a turning point for people to trust in the business. The second moment was the acquisition of Hubs.com to Proto Labs for $330M at the beginning of this year.”
“Beyond business, I think most of us remember Rockstart from the many great events and demo days with a real rock and roll vibe and our five years anniversary with the concept “be your inner rockstar ” which took place in our beautiful building on Herengracht 182, located in the centre of Amsterdam.”
Here are the key milestones achieved by Rockstart during its decade-long journey:
2011
Rockstart was founded by Oscar Kneppers, Koen Wagemakers, Rune Theill and Don Ritzen
2012
First accelerator launches in the TomTom building at Rembrandtplein, AmsterdamFirst
First Rockstart Demo Day at Undercurrent in the north of Amsterdam
Rockstart wins the prize as best investor at The Next Web awards
2013
First Impact Demo Day in Kathmandu and Amsterdam
Rockstart wins the prize as the best investor for the second year
2014
Smart Energy Accelerator launches
First Smart Energy Demo Day
Rockstart Impact Accelerator launches in Nepal
2015
Digital Health Accelerator launches
Postcron gets acquired by Socialtool.me (first)
First Digital Health Summit.
2016
Stichting DOEN joins as a strategic shareholder
Rune Theill becomes group CEO
Rockstart 5 year anniversary
Imgazine acquired by Ortec
Gibbon acquired by Degreed
Opened office in Bogota
2017
AI Accelerator launches
Rockstart Colombia launches
Wercker Acquired by Oracle
Launched Shell New Energy Challenge
2018
Opened its office in Copenhagen
Transition to dedicated domain funds
Launched Foodtrack by Maersk
2019
First close of the AgriFood Fund of €15 million
First AgriFood Demo Day in Copenhagen
Launch Feed the Future & Finture Solutions
2020
Rockstart goes Remote first
First close of the Energy Fund at €22 million
Ran its first fully remote program and demo day
Invested in more than 200 startups
2021
3D Hubs acquired for $330 million
iClinic acquired for €29 million
Brincr acquired by Visma for an undisclosed amount
Final close of the AgriFood of €22 million
Invested in more than 260 startups
Ten years anniversary
01
How Leipzig became a hub for energy and medical tech startups with IRL and SpinLab support