Located in the very centre of Europe, Poland is becoming an integral part of the European tech ecosystem, flourishing with many interesting startups and record levels of growth and investments in recent years.
One of the best places in Europe
In a new study on the best place to establish a startup, Poland ranked 3rd in Europe in terms of the relative strength of a country’s economy. The healthiest economy was ranked to consider various factors including GDP, GDP growth, GDP per capita, and unemployment rate. It’s worth mentioning that Poland has the third-lowest unemployment rate behind the Czech Republic and Germany.
Venture capital investments in Q3
Based on the latest report from PFR Ventures, the value of venture capital investments in Poland in Q3 2020 amounted to €156M. According to the data, 88 transactions were conducted between July and September 2020, with 80 funds involved.
Klaudia Babraj, the Analyst, PFR Ventures, says “Comparing Q3 2020 and Q3 2019 (without unusual transactions), our Polish market received twice as much capital.”
Out of €156M in total, €73M was secured by Polish and Finnish company ICEYE in a Series C funding round. In Q3 2020, the value of VC investments in the Polish market grew dynamically in comparison with the previous quarters.
Upward trend on Polish VC market
Przemysław Kurczewski, Deputy Director at the NCBR, says, “In Q3, notwithstanding the ICEYE megaround, we recorded a dozen of interesting transactions, including, without limitation, another fund investment from the PFR NCBR CVC portfolio: Icos III. Co-investments made by domestic and international funds more than doubled.”
Around 45% of the funds invested in Q3 constituted public-private capital, and the share of international funds in the transactions was 65%. At the same time, 71 out of 88 transactions were based on public-private capital. As many as 75 transactions were conducted by Polish teams. Also, 14 out of 88 transactions were investments involving PFR Ventures funds.
“The third quarter set the seal on the upward trend on the Polish venture capital market. We can be almost sure that in terms of the value of transactions it will be a record-breaking year and we will beat the result from 2019,” says Aleksander Mokrzycki, Vice-President of PFR Ventures.
In Q3, they provided 18% of the capital for innovative enterprises. A significant role in the seed segment is played by the funds of the National Centre for Research and Development (NCBR), which were used to conduct 46 transactions. On the other hand, the ten largest rounds of financing accounted for 85% of the value of all rounds of financing in Q3.
“Since the beginning of 2020, almost a quarter of a billion euros in total has flowed through our market. This confirms the increasing trend has been maintained. The forecasts indicate we can stay calm, expecting a new record at the end of the year,” Mokrzycki adds.
Main image credits: Georgios Tsichlis/Shutterstock
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