Female Foundry Week 72: Another way of investing early. Summertime sadness. Start with data. Continuation funds reign in secondaries. Three Point Zero: Investing in the future of learning with MPA.
Welcome to The Week 72, 2023 Edition of the Female Foundry newsletter!
Female Foundry - where investors and female founders meet.
In the news
London-based Qualis Flow, founded by Brittany Harris and Jade Cohen fetches a €8.3m Series A round led by Climate Tech VC and Systemiq Capital to decarbonise construction globally; London-based climate tech CUR8, co-founded by Marta Krupinska and Gabrielle Walker, picks up a €6.3m Pre-Seed round led by Google Ventures to accelerate the carbon removals industry; Paris-based Vizzia, co-founded by Katrin Dimitrova, bags a €3.4m Seed round from Made for All, Sista Fund, and Thierry Petit’s family office; Berlin-based DR. VIVIEN KARL, co-founded by Vivien Karl and Julia Huhnholz, fetches a €1.5m Pre-Seed round led by Dieter von Holtzbrinck Ventures for their intimate care brand.
Spotlight
Another way of investing early.
With challenging exit market conditions, it looks like an increasing number of late-stage VCs, who may not be able to deploy capital into smaller deals, are turning to fund-of-funds vehicles to gain access and visibility on the next generation of breakout tech companies. It was reported this week that a16z is preparing to launch its own fund-of-funds as part of this strategy. Other major players, such as Bain Capital and Insight Partners, have already dabbled in FoFs, with a hedge fund heavyweight, Tiger Global, also showing interest in the seed-stage market, despite reporting a 33% loss in value across its venture portfolio in 2022. Fund-of-funds have actually been facing a decline in popularity in recent years due to increased accessibility to direct venture capital and their double-fee structures. It is unlikely then, even with endorsement from prominent VCs, that we will witness a widespread adoption of FoFs across the venture market any time soon. Read full story ➯
Fundraising
Summertime sadness.
I met a founder duo at the event this week who told me they were focusing on building relationships with prospective investors (sounds great) to properly kickstart their fundraising process in early July (ekhm...what?!).
I get it. As a startup founder, you might be working around the clock, skipping Easter holidays, and occasionally having a "laid-back" Saturday. But venture capital in Europe happens only two times a year: from early January till the end of July, and again from early September till early December. Forget about closing the deal, let alone building funding momentum in August. It's not going to happen. August is always the time when most investors are off. Let me say it again: no deals happen in August! Deals that don't close in July, get dragged into early September. And believe me, you don't want to be an "old deal". So if you are struggling to draw any investor traction by early July, work on your metrics in the summer and kickstart the process in the second week of September when investors are rested, tanned, ..and full of optimism!
Start with data.
The sooner you embrace data as part of your company building process, the better. Whether you are building in the cybersecurity space or kicking around a few business ideas as part of the ideation phase of your startup, today, having a data strategy is not an option; it is a must for every startup founder. A solid data strategy will help you identify key business metrics to track and forecast (How? Read here), build predictive models of customer behaviour (How? Read here), run experiments to test product changes, build data products that enable new product features, and consequently, improve your fundraising process. Where should you start? This article and this one shed light on how to get started. And this one talks about mistakes to avoid. Looking to hire a data scientist? Read this to understand the process. And this one to make them stick with you.
Analysis
Continuation funds reign in secondaries.
In 2022, Europe witnessed a remarkable growth in secondaries ‘fundraising, with a record-breaking amount of €2.6bn. Just this year, European secondaries vehicles have already received commitments totalling €1.9bn. The surge in secondaries can be attributed to the lack of significant exits and increasing pressure on general partners to generate liquidity for their limited partners. Among the various types of secondary vehicles, continuation funds have gained notable popularity, emerging as the leading force in Europe's secondaries fundraising arena. Since the beginning of 2022, four out of the five largest funds closed were continuation funds. The largest of these to date, The Triton IV Continuation Fund, closed at a whopping €1.63bn earlier this month. As of last year, there was $131bn of dedicated dry powder to secondaries. So as long as traditional exit routes stay dry – and IPO doors are shut, continuation secondary vehicles will thrive. Read full story ➯
From the Community
Three Point Zero Podcast
Investing in the future of learning with Melody Lang, the Founding Partner of MPA.
This week, I spoke with Melody Lang from London-based MPA, a syndicate with the mission to back purpose-driven companies focused on the future of learning & work.
In the episode, we talk about the meaning behind investing with impact, why investing in the future of learning and work matters, what are the current trends driving the investment opportunities in those spaces, including the impact of ChatGPT on learning, and the strategies for sourcing investors for syndicates.
Hiring
This week hiring:
Green Got ➯ Customer Care Analyst | Zero44 ➯ Backend Engineer | Prewave ➯ Customer Success Manager.
See more jobs on the Female Foundry Job Board.
Founder & Investor Meetups
Monday-Wednesday, June 5-7 Berlin ➯ SuperVenture | Wednesday, June 7 ➯ From Vision to Success | Wednesday-Friday, June 7-9, Madrid ➯ South Summit | Friday, June 9, Amsterdam ➯ Female Founders Breakfast Club, Berlin ➯ Ask female founders, London ➯ London Tech Drinks.
Enjoy this sunny Sunday! See you next weekend.
Agata
Written by Agata Leliwa Nowicka, an investor, a startup adviser, a two-time entrepreneur, and a founder of Female Foundry based in London.
Suggestions? Drop me an email.
Check femalefoundry.co for more fundraising tools and investor content. View other Female Foundry articles.
♡
Thank you Mariangela Cordella from Nauta Capital for sourcing our weekly meetups.