byFounders, an early-stage VC fund which focuses on tech startups from the Nordic and Baltic regions of Europe has recently announced its debut fund of €100 million.
The investment came from the Danish Growth Fund, one of the most active funds in the Nordics. Further, Isomer Capital, Draper Esprit and Digital Garage, as well as a number of prominent family offices from around the Nordics also took part in the funding round.
How will they use the funds?
The Copenhagen and San Francisco based company has informed that the funds will be used to support the next generation of Nordic and Baltic tech startups to scale up and grow internationally. ByFounders officially plans to make over 30 investments in the next three years.
byFounders is well-positioned to support the next generation of globally ambitious startups through several rounds, but the fund will focus on seed and occasional Series A rounds. Whether through scaling, introductions, referrals, recruiting, global expansion or raising further funding rounds, byFounders’ portfolio companies find the advice they need in its 50-strong and growing collective. Currently, byFounders has invested in 11 portfolio companies: Corti, Peergrade, Simple Feast, Cobalt, Spiio, SafetyWing, Drugstars, Omnio, Qurasense, Tame and Uizard.
Building bridges between the Nordics and Baltics and Silicon Valley
A shortage of local funding sources has pushed many Nordic and Baltic startups to relocate to the US when they wanted to expand beyond the region and access additional funding. byFounders plans to change this by strengthening ties between Silicon Valley and the Nordics.
“With offices in both Copenhagen and San Francisco, we serve as a springboard to the world for companies with global ambitions, whether they want to move to Silicon Valley or scale from the Nordics,” mentioned byFounders in their Medium blog.
“With the emergence of funds such as byFounders, the situation has changed. With the current level of accessibility of talent, capital and knowledge, there’s no reason you can’t now both build and grow a unicorn in every Nordic country,” added Niklas Zennström, founder of Skype and Atomico
Backed by tech honchos
Supported by an impressive collective of founders who created some of the region’s most renowned companies including Skype, Zendesk, Kahoot, Unity, Tradeshift, Sitecore and Vivino, byFounders’ portfolio companies benefit from unique access to deep industry and operational knowledge as well as an extensive global network and a gateway into Silicon Valley.
byFounders’ cross Atlantic presence has also already helped AI healthcare innovator, Corti, as well as the digital nomad insurance company, SafetyWing, and penetration testing software Cobalt break into Silicon Valley.
“Our technology has the potential to save a huge number of lives around the world, but to do that we needed to be able to scale quickly, and byFounders has been instrumental in making introductions not just in Europe, but in the US as well,” added Lars Maaløe, co-founder & CTO of Corti.
“byFounders was established on the firm belief that founders are well equipped to become excellent investors,” explained Eric Lagier, Managing Partner at byFounders. “Having been in the entrepreneur’s shoes makes a huge difference when providing critical support to early-stage founders. Not only does it allow founder and investor to see eye-to-eye on the challenges facing a high-growth startup, it also makes for superb pattern recognition. Knowing what it takes to succeed, byFounders is geared to spot great potential early on.”
Stay tuned to Silicon Canals for more updates in the tech startup world.
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