Two new unicorns, a new fund, 43 new startups, a 10-year anniversary and seed fund of the year – 2018 has been
What a year 2018 has been. From closing Fund IV at £60m, with contributions from 100 members of the Seedcamp Nation, to
2018 also gave us a lot to celebrate at Seedcamp HQ. Thank you to the 300+ of you who turned out to party with us and toast to our 10-year anniversary. It’s an amazing milestone to reach and we were so happy to spend it with so many people who’ve played such an important part in our journey. We were also delighted to win seed fund of the year at the Europas and to see both Reshma and Carlos make it onto this year’s Midas List for Europe.
None of this would happen without the support of the amazing people in the Seedcamp Nation so we wanted to take this opportunity, while looking back on the year that was, to say a massive thanks to our LPs, Venture Partners, Mentors, EiRs, Angels, core team and, of course, our founders. We always talk about the Seedcamp Nation as its own thriving micro-economy and, now with well over 800 founders and close to 300 companies in the Nation, it’s a joy to see the power and value of this community continue to grow stronger. We’re in the business of numbers so we thought we’d break down some of the key stats from across Seedcamp in 2018.
2018 in Numbers:
- 4336 submission from startups looking for funding via our website
- 43 new investments
- 20 have product
- 14 pre-product
- 23 B2B
- 13 B2C
- 32% – of new investments in FinTech and HealthTech
- 2 new unicorns – Revolut and UiPath
- $2bn+ – raised by Seedcamp companies in follow-on funding
- 8% – of Fund IV companies applying Blockchain technologies across sectors
- 12 geographies – we’ve sourced companies from
- 3,500 – capsules of CruKafe consumed
- 1 Seedcamp baby – congratulations Reshma and welcome baby Enso!
- 200 Barry’s Bootcamp and 1Rebel classes taken
- 2 new Venture Partners – Devin Hunt & Stephen Allott
- 3 Summits across Product, Marketing & Leadership
- 100+ hours of Office Hours
- 1 trip to the US with portfolio companies
2018 has seen some significant raises and acquisitions across the portfolio. Here’s a snapshot of how are companies are doing, and who they’re raising follow-on funding from:
BloomsburyAI acquired by Facebook- Codeship acquired by CloudBees
Divido $15M Series A- Fishbrain $13.5M Series B
Fraugster $14M Series B- Juro $2M to take the hassle out of contracts
- Lodgify $5M Series A
- Monese $60M Series B
- Pleo closes $16M in Denmark’s largest Series A in 10 years
- Pointy $12M Series B to help bricks & mortar retailers fight off Amazon
- Poq £9.5M Series B
- Re
:infer raises $3.5M to develop cognitive automation tech Revolut raises $250M at $1.7bn valuation- The WaveVR raises $6M for social VR music platform
- Trussle £13.6M Series B for online mortgage solution
- Ui Path raises $265M Series C at $3bn valuation
- Viz.ai $21M Series A led by Kleiner Perkins and GV
Want to keep track of all the companies we’ve backed this year? A number are still in stealth mode and are doing everything from scalable tissue engineering to a micro-video platform for instant knowledge but you’ll have to hold tight a little longer to hear more about them. In the meantime, here’s a snapshot of some of the game-changing, new additions to the Seedcamp Nation
- Adia – AI-enabled reproductive health clinic in your pocket
- BuffaloGrid – Advanced mobile charging connecting the next billion
- Clearago – Revolutionising the waste management industry with data, transparency and smart technology
- Superscript – Flexible insurance for digitally native businesses
- doctorly – Enabling GPs to manage their medical practice with one simple system
- Ezra – Developing the next generation prostate cancer screening technology using AI & MRIs
- Factmata – AI for automated content scoring and verification
- Homie – Hassle-free home searching for renters
- Maze – Quantitative user-testing during the product design phase
- Nordigen – Helping banks analyse account data to approve more creditworthy customers
- Schema – A note taking tool combined with a reliable knowledge database
- Sweatcoin – A digital currency backed by physical movement
- TPH – Global marketplace for online vintage shopping
- Vantik – A digital pension for millennials
- Veratrak – Improving the visibility, security, and collaboration across the pharmaceutical supply chain using Blockchain
- Wluper – conversational intelligence
- ZERO1 – Early Supply Chain financing to help businesses thrive
Content
This Much I Know – The Seedcamp Podcast
Carlos has been busy podcasting this year with a series of exceptional guest speakers on This Much I Know. Listen back on Soundcloud as Carlos interviews thought leaders including the likes of explorer, Levison Wood, GP of JamJar Investments, Katie Marrache and Co-founder of HelloFresh, Patrick Drake. We’ve also created audio sessions from our Summits featuring the likes of innocent co-founder, Richard Reed, and Malcolm Bell.
Our Musings
- Carlos on the four phases of a founder/co-founder relationship
- Tom on why investors fight so hard for pre-emption rights
- Natasha on how to brand your startup
- Carlos on how to build a tech ecosystem
- David Mytton, EiR, on how to hire engineers part 1
- Carlos on weatherproofing your startup for any financial
cli mate - Tom on how to help your investors help you
- Natasha on how to create cut-through in crowded markets
Don’t forget, if you know any exceptional early-stage founders who you think would make a great addition to the Seedcamp Nation, then please do get in touch with us and have them submit their details via our website.
So, as 2018 draws to a close, all that’s left for us to say is thank you again to everyone who’s contributed to Seedcamp; not just this year but from the very beginning. Seedcamp would be nothing without the people so, from the bottom of our hearts, we thank you all very much for your ongoing support. We look forward to backing more exceptional entrepreneurial talent from across Europe and seeing the Nation grow in 2019.
