Unicorns Unite
By: Lana Tsiupko
Tags: Investors, Investment, Founders, Invest, Backer

100 unicorn founders back Firstminute Capital

Firstminute Capital has announced its second early stage-venture fund of $111m, and impressively has become the first venture to be backed by over 100 founders of unicorn-status companies.

Firstminute was founded in 2016 by Brent Hoberman CBE, (who also founded startups lastminute.com and made.com,) alongside Spencer Crawley. Firstminute is headquartered in London and has a team of 18 based across London, Stockholm, and Berlin, and now is looking to open an office in LA in 2022. Despite its London HQ, Firstminute has been backed by global tech leaders, which speaks to the huge potential and growth of European startups.

This week, Firstminute closed its second seed fund of $160m, giving it £211 million in assets under management, thanks to investors from founders of companies such as Farfetch, Babylon, and Checkout.com.

22 founders of businesses valued at $10bn+ have invested in this second Firstminute fund. High-profile global tech players have invested too; such as Google’s Eric Schmidt.

The 100 unicorn founders backing Firstminute Capital coincides with huge investments in European startups. A record $41bn was invested in 2020, compared to $27bn in 2018. The past year has been revolutionary for European startups, with German grocery delivery platform Gorillas breaking the record for the fastest European startup to reach unicorn status.

More and more European VCs are claiming successful founders as LPs. Founders are then able to invest in an asset that has historically been not available to individual investors. Founder LPs are also highly beneficial, as they can be a point of contact for new deals and can help navigate the tech ecosystem. This being said, this large amount of early investors in European VC is certainly an unusual success.

Founder Brent Hoberman announced: ‘European technology is reaching escape velocity, and it’s fantastic to enable so many global serial entrepreneurs to give their experience to the next generation: we have over 70 unicorn founders joining us on this journey so far, and more to come as we approach final close. Seed venture investing is attracting ever higher quality backers which will help more founders succeed.’

Ilkka Paananen, the co-founder and CEO of Supercell, commented on the 100 unicorn founder backing Firstminute Capital, stating that this speaks to both the confidence in Firstminute, and the European tech ecosystem as a whole.

RIT Capital Partners has made an unprecedented move in the European venture capital scene by becoming Firstminute’s anchor investor in their fund. RIT Capital Partners have previously invested in leading US funds such as Sequoia, Benchmark, Thrive, and Iconiq. American LPs are finding UK VC funds increasingly attractive and they are viewed as an entry point for investment in Europe.

Who is investing?

So, who is investing? Firstminute says half of the current portfolio companies are headquartered in the U.K., and the remaining half is shared between continental Europe and North America. Two-thirds of the portfolio businesses are B2B and one-third is B2C.

The investors

The following are founders and/or executives of companies that have joined the fund.