European venture capital plural It has earned a reputation for itself as one of the few venture capital firms in the region started and led by entrepreneurs who have grown their own startups, and among its founders are: Henricus recovered From Transferwise/Wise; Sten Tamkivi; And Ian Hogarth, founder of Songkick who recently added a role with the UK government in the AI Safety Strategy. Now, Plural itself is expanding its business, with a new €400m fund to support what Hogarth refers to as “transformational” startups in the region, providing more operational know-how to enable them to operate as businesses.
As with its investments to date, Plural’s main focus will continue to be on early-stage startups rather than growth rounds, he added.
When Plural originally launched in June 2022, the startup world was at a high point. Just six months ago, Atomico reported, in its annual survey, that startups in Europe had hit a record high $100 billion 2021. Arguably, Plural’s first fund of €250 million was itself a product of that: it was actually supposed to reach €150 million.
The fund announced today comes at a very different moment.
Venture capital in Europe, plagued by a weak economy, has been largely in decline over the past year. Investment in startups in 2023 fell to $45 billion. Two prominent investors arrived to set up shop in the area, Omar W coat, significantly reduced or closed its operations. Others have stayed but are playing great. Valuations have generally declined due to unmet growth targets and investors driving a hard bargain. Even Plural has kept some of its money: Hinrikus said in an interview that it is still making investments from its first fund.
Plural’s latest fund still exceeds its original target — thanks in part to the involvement of one limited partner in particular, an unnamed academic institution in the U.K., Hogarth said (other limited partners included foundations and family funds primarily outside the U.S. and Europe the first). But it didn’t come without its own struggles.
“It would be wrong to say it was easy,” Henricus told TechCrunch.
Plural – whose partners also include the co-founder Khaled Al-Helewi (former CEO of gaming company Bigpoint) and more recently Karina Namey (founder and veteran investor with a proven track record in health tech) – to date she has made 26 investments from the first fund. Activity so far has been focused around a few key categories that have proven strong in Europe overall.
AI represents nearly a third of its total investments, with “frontier technologies” (scientific breakthroughs that provide viable paths to products) accounting for 16% and climate and energy-focused startups 14%.
Notable investments from the first fund included London-based Robin AI, which It raised $26 million And earlier this month for “legal co-pilot”; Isometric, another UK startup, which raised $25 million last year for a new approach to building a decarbonisation ledger; One called the disabling of German power generation Proxima Fusion; and Unitary AI, a startup that has built multimodal technology — reading visual, audio, and text signals — to improve video content moderation.
These are some of the same categories that Plural will continue to explore when investing its latest fund, although it will take a slightly different approach when doing so.
After he took on the role Leadership The government’s AI Foundation model task force and helping to organize a high-level AI safety summit in the UK last year, Hogarth currently Head of the UK government’s newly established AI Safety Institute.
As a result, Hogarth essentially moved away from investing in and participating in AI companies that were part of his portfolio. He declined to give details on how that would be done, describing the process as “a series of dilutions” that included divestments and other measures that meant, he said, “there was no way I could benefit economically from playing this role.” “.
AI may be the current flavor of the month, but it’s not the only game, or the only opportunity, in town. Today’s tougher market appears to have given investors greater clarity in the company’s search for what Henricus describes as a “business of interest.”
So, while some may feel like the consumer ship has sailed, Plural is looking to board that ship. “We think there are some really special consumer opportunities that will emerge in the next few years,” Hogarth said.
“What we’re really interested in is the founders pursuing a very unique vision and trying to do something that looks very different,” he added. “[With] Artificial Intelligence Right now, there are a lot of people building companies that look similar to 500 other startups. So what’s most interesting is when people take a slightly less familiar route, and have a stronger perspective on how the world evolves.