List of international Venture Capital Funds interested in Portuguese based startups
Updated version at https://www.pedroalmeidavc.com
International Venture Capital funds represent a relevant source for Portuguese startups. In 2020, >40% of the rounds had the participation of an international investor. Those rounds represented 80% of the amount invested, as international investors are particularly relevant financing sources for post-seed investment. But even in seed and pre-seed rounds, international investors account for over 30% of the rounds.
For more statistics on Portuguese startups, check the Portugal Startup Activity report.
In total, there are >20 International Venture capital funds that have already investing in Portugal and more than 40 that are actively looking for Portugal.
Though I only have started collecting data for 2020, I have noticed a growing interest from international Venture Capital funds in Portugal over the last years — due to the recent success of Farfetch, Talkdesk, Outsystems, Feedzai, DefinedCrowd, among others.
Also, I have noticed that Spanish funds are increasingly deploying resources to find opportunities in Portugal — e.g., Samaipata dedicated a post explaining why they are interested in Portugal, Kibo announced that was opening an office in Lisbon, etc.
Due to my Business Angel activities and to support my portfolio companies, I interact frequently with several international venture capital funds that are interested in opportunities in Portugal.
Aiming to help all Portuguese startups in their fundraising process, I have put together a list of the Venture Capital funds interested in the region.
Check also the list of Top Venture capital funds based in Portugal. If you are in pre-seed and seed phase you might also be looking for Business Angels based in Portugal.
As the best way for entrepreneurs to connect with these funds is through the founders of the investors’ portfolio companies, I have highlighted previous investments in Portuguese companies.
I considered interesting funds that are dedicating time or money in recent years. It is a qualitative assessment, as there is limited information available, so it is pruned to error. If there is any information that is incorrect or any fund is missing you can leave a note in the comments section or interact with me via LinkedIn
Pre-seed/Accelerators
Techstars | https://www.techstars.com/
- Offices: Boulder/USA, Lisbon/Portugal and other >30 locations
- Prior investments in PT: >10 | DOCdoc (https://dodoc.com/), Mobiag (https://mobiag.com/), GustU (https://www.guestu.com), MyDidimo (https://www.mydidimo.com), Attentive (https://attentive.us/), Graphenest (https://www.graphenest.com), Muzzley (https://www.muzzley.com/), Sensei (https://www.sensei.tech/), Secret City Trails (https://www.secretcitytrails.com/), Emotai (https://www.emotai.tech/), Rnters (https://rnters.com/), Apres (https://www.apres.io), Infinite Foundry (https://www.infinitefoundry.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 100k$
- Person looking to Portugal: Hugo Augusto
Seedcamp | https://seedcamp.com/
- Offices: London, UK
- Prior investments in PT: 8 | Student Finance (https://www.studentfinance.com/), Hole19 (https://www.hole19golf.com/), Zercatto (http://www.zercatto.com/), Codacy (https://www.codacy.com/), Kitch (https://eatkitch.com/), James (https://james.finance/), Popcorn metrics (https://www.popcornmetrics.com/), Hoko (http://hoko.io/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 150k€-1M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Sia Houchangnia
500startups | https://500.co/
- Offices: SF/USA (HQ), over 20 locations
- Prior investments in PT: 3 | Infraspeak (https://www.infraspeak.com/), Prodsmart (https://prodsmart.com/), Talkdesk (https://www.talkdesk.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 150k$, minus the program cost
- Person looking to Portugal: Pedro Santos Vieira
YCombinator | https://www.ycombinator.com/
- Offices: SF/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 3 | Unbabel (https://unbabel.com/), Orankl (https://www.orankl.com/), Esla Speak (https://elsaspeak.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 125k$
Seed to Series A venture capital firms (300k€-5M€)
Join Capital | https://www.join.capital/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 3 | Codacy (https://www.codacy.com/), Prodsmart (https://prodsmart.com/), Valispace (https://www.valispace.com/)
- Thesis: B2B
- Tickets: 500k€-3M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Jan Borgstädt
All Iron Ventures | http://www.alliron.vc/
- Offices: Bilbao/Spain
- Prior investments in PT: 2 | Zenklub (https://zenklub.com.br/), Barkyn (https://www.barkyn.com/)
- Thesis: Marketplace
- Tickets: 1M€-5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Hugo Fdez.-Mardomingo
Kibo Ventures | http://kiboventures.com/
- Offices: Madrid/Spain
- Prior investments in PT: 2 | DefinedCrowd (https://www.definedcrowd.com/), Hole19 (https://www.hole19golf.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 1M€-5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Pedro Trinité
Vesalius Biocapital Partners | https://www.vesaliusbiocapital.com/
- Offices: Luxembourg
- Prior investments in PT: 2 | SWORD Health (https://swordhealth.com/), Tonic App (https://www.tonicapp.com/)
- Fund: Drug development, medical devices & diagnostics and eHealth / mHealth
- Tickets: 1M€-5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: David Malta
Cherry | http://www.cherry.vc/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Dashdash (https://dashdash.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic but strong experience with marketplaces
- Tickets: 1M€-5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Marguerite de Tavernost
Firstminute Capital | https://www.firstminute.capital/
- Office: London, UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Infraspeak (https://www.infraspeak.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 250k€-3M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Lina Wenner
Frontline | https://www.frontline.vc/
- Offices: London, UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | James (https://james.finance/)
- Thesis: B2B, SaaS, bringing Europe and US
- Tickets: 500k€-3m€
- Person looking to Portugal: Carolina Kung
LocalGlobe | https://localglobe.vc/
- Office: London, UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Stratio Automotive (https://stratioautomotive.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 1–5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: George Henry
Mangrove | https://www.mangrove.vc
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Attentive (https://attentive.us/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 1–10M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Yannick Oswald
Octopus Ventures | https://octopusventures.com/
- Offices: London/UK, New York/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Uniplaces (https://www.uniplaces.com/)
- Thesis: health, money and deep tech
- Tickets: 1M€-10M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Rebecca Hunt
Speedinvest | https://speedinvest.com/
- Offices: London/UK, Vienna/Austria, Munchen/Germany, Berlin/Germany, SF/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Secret City Trails (https://www.secretcitytrails.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 500k-3M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Markus Lang
Adara | https://www.adaravp.com/
- Offices: Madrid/Spain, Luxembourg and SF/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: Deep tech, Europe
- Tickets: 500k€ — 3M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Ross Strachan
Angular Ventures | https://www.angularventures.com/
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: Seed, Deeptech, Enterprise
- Tickets: 200k$-1M$
- Person looking to Portugal: Gil Dibner
Basinghall Partners | https://www.basinghallpartners.com/
- Offices: London/UK, Lisbon/Portugal, Munich/Germany, and Luxembourg
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: B2B
- Tickets: 250k-1M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Ilya Velder
BlueYard | https://blueyard.com/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: Deeptech, Blockchain
- Tickets: 1–5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Juan Pinilla
Caixa Capital Risc | https://www.caixacapitalrisc.es/
- Offices: Madrid/Spain
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: SaaS, B2B, Health, Life Sciences
- Tickets: 500k€-5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Roma Jelinskaite
KFund | https://kfund.co/
- Offices: Madrid, Spain
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: Digital companies
- Tickets: 300k€-2M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Pablo Ventura
Hoxton Ventures | http://www.hoxtonventures.com/
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 500k$-5M$
- Person looking to Portugal: Hussein Kanji
Nauta Capital | https://nautacapital.com/
- Offices: Barcelona/Spain, London/UK, Munchen/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: B2B, capital-efficient
- Tickets: 1–5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Borja Lajas
Point 9 | http://www.pointninecap.com/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Thesis: SaaS, Marketplace
- Tickets: 1–5M€
- Person looking to Portugal: Ricardo Sequerra
Partech | https://partechpartners.com/
- Offices: Paris/France
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: €200K to €50M
- Person looking to Portugal: Boris Golden
Profounders | https://www.profounderscapital.com/
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: €1–3M
- Person looking to Portugal: Sean Seton-Rogers
Project-a | https://www.project-a.com/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: €1–7M
- Person looking to Portugal: Nina Jetter
Samaipata | https://samaipata.vc/
- Offices: Madrid/Spain
- Prior investments in PT: 0 | Post: Why we believe in the Portuguese Ecosystem
- Thesis: Marketplaces
- Tickets: €500k-5M
- Person looking to Portugal: Sebastián Fernández-Medrano
Series A and beyond venture capital firms (>3M€)
e.ventures | https://www.eventures.vc/
- Offices: Berlin/Germany, SF/USA, Beijing/China, Tokyo/Japan, São Paulo/Brazil
- Prior investments in PT: 3 | Farfetch (https://www.farfetch.com/), Aptoide (https://www.aptoide.com), Unbabel (https://www.unbabel.com/)
- Fund: Consumer, Internet, Software
- Tickets: 4M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Jonathan Becker
Index Ventures | http://indexventures.com/
- HQ: London/UK, SF/USA, Geneva/Switzerland
- Prior investments in PT: 2 | Farfetch (https://www.farfetch.com/), Remote (https://remote.com/)
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Martin Mignot
Lakestar | https://www.lakestar.com/
- Offices: Zurich/Switzerland, Berlin/Germany, London/UK, New York/USA and Hong Kong
- Prior investments in PT: 2 | Casafari (https://www.casafari.com/), Dashdash (https://dashdash.com/)
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Stephen Nundy
Accel | https://www.accel.com/
- Offices: Bay Area/USA, London/UK, Bangalore/India
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Dashdash (https://dashdash.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Andrei Brasoveanu
Atomico | https://www.atomico.com/
- HQ: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Uniplaces (https://www.uniplaces.com/)
- Thesis: Agnostic, Europe (interesting report https://2019.stateofeuropeantech.com/)
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Ben Blume
Balderton | https://www.balderton.com/
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | DefinedCrowd (https://www.definedcrowd.com/)
- Thesis: Series A-B, Agnostic
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Cayetana Hurtado
Notion Capital | https://notion.vc/
- Offices: London/UK
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Unbabel (https://unbabel.com/)
- Thesis: B2B, SaaS
- Tickets: 3M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Chris Tottman
USV | https://www.usv.com/
- Offices: NY/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Veniam (https://veniam.com/)
- Thesis: Thesis driven (https://www.usv.com/writing/topic/usv-investment-thesis/)
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Albert Wenger
White Star Capital | http://whitestarvc.com/
- Offices: London/UK, Paris/France, Montreal/Canada, New York/USA
- Prior investments in PT: 1 | Hole19 (https://www.hole19golf.com/)
- Thesis: B2C and B2B Marketplaces, e-commerce, SaaS
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Nicholas Stock
IdInvest | https://www.idinvest.com/en
- Offices: Paris/France (HQ) and other 9 locations
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: Agnostic
- Tickets: 5M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Nicolas Debock
Seaya | https://seayaventures.com/
- Offices: Madrid/Spain, São Paulo/Brazil, Mexico DC/Mexico
- Prior investments in PT: 0
- Fund: B2C
- Tickets: 3M€-
- Person looking to Portugal: Aristotelis Xenofontos
Originally published at https://www.pedroalmeidabusinessangel.com on June 15, 2020.