Amsterdam-based Keen Venture Partners, a venture capital firm that invests in fast-growing European scale-ups at the Series A and B stage, announced that it has closed its second fund at €120M. The firm is targeting €150M with a final close sometime next year.
The funding came from new and existing investors including the European Investment Fund, KPN Ventures, and several well-known tech entrepreneurs including founders of JustEatTakeaway.com, Adyen, and TomTom.
Keen Venture’s first fund invested in scale-ups such as Beekeeper, Crisp, Farewill, and Rescale in their Series A and B round. With its Fund II, the firm says it will invest between €5 to €10M per company.
Robert Verwaayen, General Partner at Keen Venture Partners, says, “Our first investment was already announced with Plan A, and we expect to close several more very soon. We will continue to go for Series A & B rounds in European scale-ups.”
“We back exceptional teams”
Founded in 2014, Keen Venture Partners invests in exceptional teams and fast-growing scaleups across Europe at the Series A and Series B stage. The firm begins by investing time first and money later by sharing its network, experience, and capabilities before any investment possibility arises.
The firm does not invest at the Seed stage but instead focuses on the scale-up stage. Keen’s investment ideas are based on fundamental trends in specific areas of technology – areas where it feels it can make a real contribution with its experience and network.
Robert Verwaayen explains, “So when we approach entrepreneurs we first try to forge meaningful relationships prior to investing. We do so by helping out. This could be something small and tactical, like benchmarking a cohort model, or more strategic by helping land a dream partnership deal. All before an investment is even discussed. This way, an entrepreneur can test Keen’s capabilities and network before getting us on the cap-table. At the same time, more trust boosts our conviction allowing us to invest fast and friendly.”
The firm works with ready-to-scale tech companies in categories including data and intelligence, software services, and digital models. It looks for teams that are building category-leading companies in Next Generation Networks (NGNs), virtualisation, IoT platforms, big data, Machine Learning, smart hardware, and robotics.
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