0TO9
0TO9 is a European fintech venture builder and investor, operating as a 'bank for entrepreneurship.' They focus on providing infrastructure, capital, and operational support for fintech entrepreneurs aiming to build and scale the next generation of financial products and platforms. Their name signifies their mission: from zero to success, idea to impact, and from now to what's next. The firm differentiates itself by offering not only capital investment but also by building a dream team for ventures, covering areas like compliance, communications, and brand development. They combine the stability of a bank with the agility of a startup, making them unique in the fintech venture space. 0TO9 emphasizes building with experience, bringing in builders who have successfully launched and scaled financial products. This hands-on approach is designed to remove friction and accelerate the path to profitability. They aim to free up founders to focus on their core product and platform development by managing other aspects of the business. The firm is founded by Oliver Hildebrandt, who has extensive experience in fintech, stemming from 17 years and five companies. The firm's approach is heavily influenced by the idea of teamwork and collaboration, where the right team with the relevant experiences can build and rebuild anything.
13books Capital
13books Capital, formerly Element Ventures, focuses on backing bold founders transforming the financial technology landscape. They are specialists, partnering with Europe's best fintech founders who have global ambitions. The firm emphasizes building lasting relationships with founders, recognizing that meaningful change takes time. Their investment strategy revolves around identifying and supporting companies that are innovating in the way the world thinks about money. While the website doesn't explicitly state the size of fund or AUM, the focus on fintech startups across various stages suggests a strategy aimed at long-term growth and impact in the sector.
1991 Ventures
Investing in early-stage startups in CEE and Ukraine that are pivotal to rebuilding Europe's tech sector, with a focus on strategic industries like security, defense, AI infrastructure, fintech, logistics, energy, and healthcare.
1Up Ventures
1Up Ventures is a venture capital firm that focuses on backing extraordinary individuals in the ANZ (Australia and New Zealand) startup ecosystem. They aim to provide a launch platform for startups with the ambition to change the world, suggesting an impact-driven investment approach. The firm values alignment with founders and emphasizes being good people to work with, offering support to help founders "level up."
Actyus
Actyus invests in high-potential companies with a mission to drive innovation and social impact. They partner with best-in-class entrepreneurs to create unique, value-adding products while monitoring portfolios closely for continuous support. Focused on sectors like fintech, private equity, and real estate, with a commitment to SDGs and positive cultural values.
Allianz X
Allianz X invests in established digital leaders operating in sectors aligned with insurance and asset management, leveraging their expertise to drive innovation and growth in fintech, cybersecurity, and digital banking.
Alpine Ventures
Alpine Ventures focuses on investing in product-obsessed founders across three core themes, all centered around software enablement. They prioritize the quality and user impact of a product over traditional metrics like educational background, prior work experience, or location. Their investment strategy revolves around identifying and supporting founders building innovative software solutions that cater to consumers, prosumers, and small businesses. Alpine's approach emphasizes a deep understanding of user needs and a commitment to building exceptional products. The firm targets sectors where software can significantly improve user experiences and create lasting value. This includes opportunities in consumer tech that enhance daily life, prosumer software that empowers individuals and professionals, and SMB software that streamlines operations for small businesses and freelancers. Alpine believes that software is a powerful tool for driving innovation and creating positive change across various industries. Alpine's investment philosophy is driven by a belief in the power of product-led growth. They seek out companies that are building intuitive, user-friendly software solutions that attract and retain customers organically. The firm looks for founders who have a clear vision for their product and are passionate about creating a positive impact on their users. Alpine's commitment to product-obsessed founders sets them apart and enables them to identify and support some of the most promising software companies in the market.
Amber Group
Amber Group invests in and provides institutional-grade solutions for digital assets, including wealth and asset management, liquidity provision, and infrastructure. They focus on empowering organizations and individuals to navigate the intersection of traditional and digital finance through pioneering technology and regulatory expertise. Amber Labs specifically targets leading Web3 projects across primary markets, fostering global industry growth.
Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) accelerator / a16z speedrun
Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) operates on the conviction that software is eating the world, focusing on identifying and investing in technology companies poised to become highly valuable. The firm takes a long-term view, believing that the future belongs to builders and aims to provide them with the necessary resources to succeed. They emphasize investing in companies that are helping to achieve a better future. They are optimistic about the future and supportive of entrepreneurs, even in failure. They believe in doing "first class business and only in a first class way", indicating a high standard of ethics and professionalism. They stress truth and honesty in all dealings and consider relationships to be paramount.
Araya Ventures
Backing exceptional founders globally across AI, healthcare, commerce, fintech, and the future of work, with a focus on diverse leadership in sectors like healthcare, climate, fintech, and deeptech/AI.
Augmentum Fintech PLC
Augmentum Fintech PLC is a publicly listed fintech fund focused on backing category-leading European fintech companies in their early stages. Their investment thesis revolves around identifying and supporting companies poised for rapid growth within the fintech ecosystem. They emphasize providing not just capital, but also specialist advice and connections, particularly concerning regulators, policymakers, talent acquisition, and engagement with incumbent financial institutions. Augmentum seeks to be a patient capital provider, leveraging their industry expertise and extensive network to foster innovation and drive substantial growth for their portfolio companies. Augmentum's strategy includes a deep understanding of the fintech landscape, built upon the collective experience of their partners, who have invested in over 100 fintech companies across 16 years. They aim to be more than just investors, positioning themselves as active partners who provide strategic guidance and operational support to help their portfolio companies navigate the complexities of the fintech market. This hands-on approach extends to facilitating connections and providing resources that are crucial for scaling fintech businesses, such as access to talent and regulatory expertise. The firm aims to build long-term relationships with their portfolio companies. By being publicly listed, Augmentum offers a unique structure compared to traditional venture capital funds, potentially allowing for a longer-term investment horizon and greater flexibility in capital deployment. This structure also brings added scrutiny and transparency, aligning the fund's interests with those of its public shareholders. Augmentum's strategy also centers around portfolio diversification across various segments within the fintech ecosystem, including digital banking, asset management, and other emerging areas, aiming to capture a wide range of opportunities within the rapidly evolving fintech sector. Augmentum aims to be a 'go-to' fund for fintech entrepreneurs looking for capital and strategic support, with a team of well-networked and experienced entrepreneurs and investors that have been on both sides of the fence. Augmentum states on its website that this insight into fintech and scaling at pace have been instrumental to portfolio company rapid growth to date.
Azimut Libera Impresa SGR – Azimut Digitech Fund
Azimut is an independent global asset management, wealth management, investment banking, and fintech group serving individuals and businesses. They focus on both developed and emerging markets. Their investment approach appears to incorporate ESG principles, aiming for sustainable growth and responsible governance. Azimut emphasizes a community-oriented approach, engaging with associations, schools, and territorial entities to benefit individuals and communities. A significant portion of their shares is held by individual shareholders and international institutional investors, with a core group of financial advisors, managers, employees, and management holding a substantial stake, creating a strong alignment of interests.
Azimut Venture Capital
Azimut is an independent global asset management, wealth management, investment banking, and fintech group serving individuals and businesses. They are a public company listed on the Milan Stock Exchange, a leader in Italy, and present in 19 countries, focusing on emerging and frontier markets. The firm distinguishes itself through its focus on sustainability, integrating environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles into its investment strategies and business operations. They also prioritize community engagement through Fondazione Azimut Ente Filantropico and social responsibility projects. Azimut emphasizes long-term value creation through a network of financial advisors, investment professionals and a governance structure designed to protect the interests of all stakeholders. A key feature of their ownership structure is that over 1,900 financial advisors, managers, employees, and management are shareholders through a syndicate agreement that controls 22% of the company.
Base10 Advancement Initiative
Base10 invests in automation-driven startups that solve real-world problems for the 99%. Their portfolio includes companies leveraging AI, automation, and software to transform industries like fintech, legal, travel, and productivity. They also donate 50% of their carried interest to the next generation of technology founders.
Breyer Capital
Breyer Capital is a premier venture capital investor focused on catalyzing high-impact entrepreneurs. They frame strategic investments anchored by the passion of founders, the insights of their network of world-class investors, and a conviction that artificial intelligence and machine learning will transform technology and investment opportunities globally. They view technology as an enabler, not a replacer. The firm is guided by principles of humility, integrity, and a passion for true long-term risks and bets that can result not only in significant financial returns and outcomes, but in dramatic social impact as well. They have deep passion for social media, entertainment/media, digital health, and financial technologies and care deeply about how artificial intelligence, machine learning, and virtual reality will come to redefine and transform all of these unique spaces.
Bridford Group
Bridford Group is a permanent capital investor based in London and Amsterdam, managing a portfolio of over 30 businesses. They invest their own capital in businesses across various sectors, stages of growth, and countries, with a primary focus on founder-led businesses exhibiting long-term potential. Unlike traditional investment funds, Bridford Group's permanent capital structure allows for a patient, flexible, and long-term approach, fully aligning with founders seeking to build substantial companies. They prioritize highly scalable businesses with the potential for significant growth across multiple countries, particularly those demonstrating a strong element of societal or environmental welfare. Bridford Group backs challengers who can redefine industries, address significant problems, or provide solutions to existing industry bottlenecks and inefficiencies. While their investment history leans towards early-stage companies, Bridford Group is also capable of investing in more mature, growth-oriented businesses. They prefer concepts that have been tested and proven to have a market, are not heavily reliant on external factors for success, possess material organic growth potential, and can operate as stand-alone profitable entities. Their geographical focus is primarily Europe. Bridford Group typically seeks investments that grant them a meaningful minority position in a company, though they are open to taking majority positions. They are able to lead investments or participate in broader financing rounds. Bridford places significant emphasis on the teams they back, seeking founders and management teams with strong determination, effectiveness, exceptional execution skills, and an ambition to generate long-term value. They prefer companies managed by individuals capable of attracting high-quality talent. Bridford Group actively contributes to the development of their portfolio companies through operational support, including corporate development, financial and legal guidance, strategic advice and business development, team-building and hiring, and cross-fertilization with other portfolio companies. They avoid investments in companies with negative environmental or social impacts.
Capital 49
Capital 49 invests in bold, disruptive startups that redefine industries. Backed by Airwallex founders, it leverages hypergrowth expertise to support founders navigating rapid scaling across global markets, with a focus on AI infrastructure, fintech, and enterprise platforms.
Carbon13
Carbon13 is a venture builder focused on addressing the climate emergency. They believe entrepreneurs will change the trajectory of climate change. The firm builds and backs ventures capable of mitigating at least 10M tonnes of CO2e per annum once at scale. They harness the entrepreneurial spirit by engaging with academia, business, policy makers, NGOs, consumers, new standards and finance. Carbon13 is committed to creating ventures that wouldn't otherwise exist by connecting founders, encouraging those unsure about entrepreneurship, and helping individuals find the right cofounder. They focus on supporting ventures in becoming more resilient and impactful. Their goal is to build ventures that mitigate over 400 million tonnes of CO2e per annum by 2040.
Clear Haven Capital Management
Clear Haven Capital Management focuses on asset-backed credit investments, believing in creating value with real substance. They seek opportunities through a rigorous understanding of fundamentals and a commitment to identifying overlooked potential. They describe themselves as analytical, disciplined, and driven by results, thriving in complexity and partnering with those who share their determination and long-term vision. The firm's strategy involves identifying investable cash flow streams that offer a balance of visibility, predictability, and return potential. They leverage deep domain expertise to craft efficient and effective solutions for both borrowers and investors, aiming to align capital with opportunity and create sustainable value and resilient investment outcomes. They serve borrowers and investors of all sizes through their full lifecycle asset-backed credit platform. Clear Haven delivers balance sheet solutions to support companies through every stage of their growth cycle. They provide individuals, family offices, and institutional investors access to high-quality, asset-backed credit opportunities, creating resilient portfolios designed to perform across market cycles. They tailor investment strategies to provide enhanced yield while aligning with each client’s duration, liquidity, capital, and jurisdictional requirements, especially within the insurance sector. Their purpose is to create enduring value through innovative disciplined credit strategies to empower businesses and investors. The firm has originated over $2.5B in investments, has 30+ active companies, and has been operating for 6+ years.
Companisto
Companisto is an investment network focused on connecting startups and growth companies with business angels and investors. They facilitate venture capital investments in innovative companies and ideas, operating as a fintech company emphasizing lean processes, specialized knowledge, and efficient solutions in online corporate finance. They aim to promote a founding culture in Germany and Europe by partnering with pioneers who demonstrate the urge and determination to explore new paths to success, recognizing that these pioneers often take risks to create great things. Companisto provides a platform where everyday individuals can participate in funding rounds with smaller investment amounts, alongside more significant angel investments.
DeBa Ventures
DeBa Ventures is a venture capital firm focused on discovering, supporting, and promoting founders crafting the future of fintech. They are more than just investors; they aim to be partners in shaping the future of the fintech industry by seeking out passionate entrepreneurs solving real-world problems through innovation. The firm emphasizes a founder-driven approach, leveraging the experience of their team, which includes successful exited entrepreneurs and seasoned fund managers. They provide tailored mentorship and strategic support, recognizing the unique challenges startups face. DeBa Ventures offers flexible investment models and fosters a collaborative partnership through their network of experts and advisors, combined with regular strategic sessions. Their investment strategy is global and prioritizes fintech companies, along with B2B, AI and SaaS, reflecting a commitment to fostering innovation in these dynamic sectors without geographical limitations. They believe in nurturing innovation and building a collaborative journey with visionary founders. The firm's mission is to uncover, nurture, and elevate the entrepreneurs shaping the future. DeBa Ventures distinguishes itself with a unique shared success model, allocating 10% of their profits back to the employees of their portfolio companies, acknowledging their contributions to collective achievements and growth. This policy reflects their belief in rewarding dedication and hard work, creating a mutually beneficial partnership. They measure their achievements by the great entrepreneurs they partner with, highlighting their portfolio's forward-looking companies.
Dieter von Holtzbrinck Ventures
Dieter von Holtzbrinck Ventures (DvH Ventures) is an early-stage investor in Europe, focusing on partnering with passionate founders who are disrupting industries. Since 2014, they have positioned themselves as active investors, managing multiple venture capital funds from their Cologne office. Initially, DvH Ventures focused on publishing-related digital business models, leveraging the media reach of Handelsblatt, Tagesspiegel, and DIE ZEIT publishing groups to support their portfolio companies. They then expanded into fintech and insurtech investments, building a successful portfolio in those sectors. Today, DvH Ventures operates two independent early-stage investment funds. Their Digital Tech Fund (DvH Ventures Fund III) invests primarily in deep tech and education startups. In 2020, they launched a Digital Health Fund (DvH Ventures Fund IV) with a first closing of €70 million, targeting technologies that solve future healthcare challenges across Europe. DvH Ventures acts as a partner with strong entrepreneurial passion, providing expertise and networks to their portfolio companies and founders. They emphasize close and trusting interactions. Their investment approach involves taking lead positions in early-stage rounds, providing not only financial resources but also management expertise and an international investor network. Additionally, DvH Ventures offers a media-for-equity program, granting access to brands like Handelsblatt, WirtschaftsWoche, DIE ZEIT, and Apotheken Umschau to provide portfolio companies with significant reach into target markets. They are always seeking innovative ideas, even outside their defined focus areas, from compelling entrepreneurs. DvH Ventures focuses on building successful investment clusters, including digital health, education, and financial services, while remaining open to digital innovation in areas like artificial intelligence, enterprise software, the Internet of Things, big data, mobility, energy, and the future of work. The firm culture emphasizes working at eye level with founders, celebrating successes, overcoming challenges together, and operating in a fast, unbureaucratic, and highly professional manner. They commit to providing hands-on support for the growth of their portfolio companies with full entrepreneurial commitment.
Digital Ocean Ventures Starter
Digital Ocean Ventures Starter (DOV.VC) focuses on backing early-stage fintech and digital transformation startups, especially those leveraging AI. They seek to invest in companies that are designed for the venture path, exhibiting sharp insights, unfair distribution advantages, or defensible data that compounds over time. They prioritize understanding the founders, the customer pain points, and the business logic under pressure before making an investment. Recognizing that not every good business is suited for venture capital, they exercise selectivity. When they invest, DOV.VC commits time and attention alongside capital, acting as partners and providing skin in the game. DOV.VC believes that venture capital should genuinely help build better companies. They emphasize understanding over speed, opting to spend more time upfront evaluating the people, the problem being solved, and the scalability of the business model. They are comfortable saying no to businesses that might be good but not venture-scalable, focusing on where their capital, time, and partnership can accelerate long-term value creation. They consider themselves partners rather than just capital providers and offer hands-on support to founders through both favorable and challenging periods. This high-touch approach involves significant involvement, attention, and commitment, emphasizing a deep trust and belief in the companies they support. They invest in people they'd want to work with, focusing on real-world problems and businesses with enduring, scalable systems.
Earlybird
Earlybird invests in pan-European tech companies that are poised to create breakthroughs. They provide financial backing, strategic support, and access to a global network, aiming to support founders from idea to IPO. Their focus includes sectors like fintech, healthtech, AI, and deep tech, with a commitment to backing ambitious early-stage founders.