Harry Stebbings

We had the pleasure of speaking to the inimitable Gordon Sanghera, co-founder and CEO of Oxford Nanopore Technologies, valued at around $6.8bn in 2021. Gordon somewhat accidentally ended up as an entrepreneur, breaking the conventional VC wisdom around 'born founders'. The technology is wild - democratising access to genomic sequencing giving us a new understanding of living organisms. In the episode of Riding Unicorns, we cover: 00:00 Defining Entrepreneurship 00:55 Understanding Oxford Nanopore's Technology 06:10 Gordon's Journey to Founding Oxford Nanopore 12:09 Commercialization Challenges and Strategies 16:27 Building a Strong Founding Team 20:55 Navigating the Ups and Downs of Deep Tech 25:54 Innovative Applications of Nanopore Technology 28:57 Company Culture and Operational Insights 35:05 Attracting Talent in a Competitive Market 37:22 The IPO Experience and Future Outlook https://lnkd.in/eQZVSGeK

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I couldn’t be prouder to be a Venture Partner at Isomer Capital (aka the best European FoF - at least for me) as we just announced the launch of our pioneering £100m secondaries fund. This fund is dedicated to acquiring stakes from LPs in various VC funds, tapping into a massive and largely unexplored market. 🌟 Key Highlights: - Focused Investment: Primarily targeting stakes in VC funds, with selective investments in private companies. - Robust Funding: Already over 20% funded, thanks to strong support from Nordic family offices and a German foundation. - Market Potential: With a growing number of private tech companies and a VC liquidity crunch, Europe's VC secondaries market is poised for rapid growth. - Track Record: This isn’t Isomer’s first foray into the secondaries market. As a firm we’ve done several secondaries deals with portfolio companies and VC firms, including early-stage VC Seedcamp (in 2021) and mobility giant Bolt (in 2023). - Expert Team: Welcoming the amazing Omolade (Rachel) A., formerly of Coller Capital, as a principal to lead this initiative. 💡 Investment Strategy: - 65-75% of the fund will buy "LP interest" stakes in VC funds. - 15-25% will be directed towards stakes in companies. - Up to 15% reserved for flexible investment opportunities. 📈 Looking Ahead: We're targeting returns of 2-3x, with significant distributions expected in the next 4-7 years. As one of the few players in this space, we're not just participating in the market—we're driving it forward. Read all about it here: https://lnkd.in/dc7sbC3G #VentureCapital #SecondariesFund #EuropeanVC

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Counting down to launch :) Eva, Sam and I are hosting a webinar tomorrow at 1300 UK time on cold investor outreach. We'll cover best practice, along with investor + founder perspectives. Now at ~800 registrations - sign up link below. #capitalraising #startups #fundraising #founders

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ANNOUNCEMENT: We just launched our diversified fund investments feature on Mainshares 😲 Starting today, accredited investors can invest in SMB acquisitions managed by sophisticated investors via Mainshares I’ve been telling you all that we’re here to change the game of SMB investing for the better, and this is a huge step for us. Before, SMB investing was commonly done on a deal-by-deal basis, and depending on who you are, you may not have the time to spend parsing out every deal. Well now, investors on our platform have access to deals across a variety of industries, geographies, and deal structures in this (traditionally) inaccessible and fragmented asset class. Invest in ~20 SMBs, all with a single investment. Join the Mainshares train before we take off like a 🚀 Link below for diversified SMB investing 👇

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Striking: Zenobē, a UK climate tech startup, raised £600m from KKR and £270m from Infracapital, bypassing VC entirely. Zenobe captures excess energy from wind farms to stabilize the grid and reduce gas power reliance. This means: Zenobe secured one of 2023's biggest startup fundraises — without any venture capital. #battery #fundraising #venturecapital #energystorage #infrastructure #growthinflection Sifted: https://lnkd.in/g8wF-xA5

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Numbers & insights from a deep tech venture studio that launched 11 companies (all are active) in the last 7 years, reaching £85M valuation across the portfolio: 1. Post Urban, initially bootstrapped by Luke Robinson, an academic with a PhD in physics from Cambridge, now operates with external funding from a UK-based fund. 2. Launched 5 companies during the first 5 years and 6 companies during the last 2 years. 3. All 11 completed pre-seed rounds; 1 of them got Series A, 2 of them are approaching their Series A. 4. The startups have collectively raised ~£25M in venture capital, in addition to receiving grants. The total valuation of the 11 companies is ~£85M, half of which have not yet undergone subsequent funding rounds. 5. Initial equity splits: the venture builder 20%, CEOs of startups 35% (vests over 4 years), CTOs – 20-25%, employees 10-15%. 6. The initial valuation of startups was £2 million, with £300K invested by the venture builder. The last 2 startups were at £3.5-4M initial valuation. 7. Building deep tech ventures requires significantly higher initial funding because these projects need more time to develop demonstrable products. Two portfolio companies hit £1M in ARR. 8. The venture builder has increased the capital for the last 2 startups to ensure they reach meaningful milestones. The CEOs of the startups were able to secure additional funding through their networks, £350K and £450K, respectively. 9. The deep tech investor pool is smaller than that for sectors like SaaS, which requires a stronger proof of concept and market readiness to attract funding. 10. 3-4 times, potential customers became investors in Post Urban Ventures. This is a great approach because it secures investment and validates the concept by gauging whether these potential customers truly believe in the solution and its market necessity. 11. They don't start with a technology or an idea; instead, they integrate insights about global problems and, by actively engaging with advisory boards, founders, and industry experts, identify pain points and align them with technological solutions. 12. They do not bring universities in as co-founders but source scientists or professors to contribute to research and development. This involves leveraging academic expertise to support the technical aspects of startup projects until a prototype is developed. 13. The studio maintains strong connections with major academic institutions, including Cambridge, Oxford, Imperial College, and UCL, supporting its deep tech focus and facilitating access to new technologies and potential founders. 14. Areas of focus in deep tech: AI (Knowledge Graphs, NLP, DNNs, Computer Vision, Edge AI, Active Learning), Quantum Technologies, Biotech, AgTech, Enterprise SaaS. Watch the full interview to gain insights into the portfolio companies, handling IP collaborations with universities, key challenges, and team construction: https://lnkd.in/dCi7fZ7G

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🚀 Seraphim Space Investment Trust: Leading the Charge with 74% YTD Return! 🌟 Some great news to share, Seraphim Space Investment Trust (SSIT) was the top performing investment trust YTD - thanks to the The Association of Investment Companies (AIC) for highlighting this today! In a year of economic challenges, Seraphim Space Investment Trust has emerged as the top-performing investment trust, achieving an impressive 74% total return YTD (11 months to 30 November 2024). 🔹 What sets Seraphim apart? Seraphim Space’s strategic focus on high-growth space technologies has driven exceptional performance, positioning it as a leader in the Growth Capital sector. This remarkable performance comes ahead of other strong contenders like Petershill Partners (+71%) and 3i Group (+56%), underscoring the strength and resilience of space-related investments. 🔑 Key Takeaways: Top Performer: Seraphim Space outpaced all investment trusts, with a YTD return of 74%. Strong Sector Position: Space tech continues to show its value in a competitive market. In an unpredictable market, Seraphim’s strong growth in the space economy proves that space-focused investments are not only resilient but also poised for the future. https://lnkd.in/dyedHb3c

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🌱 Calling all Seed Founders! 🌱 Are you an early-stage startup seeking investment? My latest article is a comprehensive guide to the UK's SEIS and the investors participating in it. Here's what you'll find inside: ✨ Understanding SEIS for early-stage 💼 Must have documents to secure funding 🕵‍♀️ List of 24 active SEIS funds across sectors If you represent a SEIS fund not yet featured, feel free to comment below or reach out to me directly. 💬 I'd love to include you and help connect more founders to the right investors. Link to article in the comments 🔗

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Insightful article….worth a read.

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🚀 Blueprint to Success: Building Mattioli Woods plc from the Ground Up 🚀 Discover the remarkable journey of Ian Mattioli, who transformed a humble idea in his garage into the powerhouse known as Mattioli Woods. In this video, Ian shares invaluable insights on maintaining work-life balance, structuring a startup for success, and evolving from pensions to comprehensive wealth management. Learn how strategic vision and family support are critical in navigating the complexities of business growth. Perfect for entrepreneurs seeking inspiration on executing their vision effectively. #Entrepreneurship #WealthManagement #BusinessGrowth #MattioliWoods #LeadershipLessons

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Liquidity or exit planning is often taboo leading to many companies being ill prepared. Successful outcomes are years in the making - they start and end with proactive prep (e.g. getting your house in order, developing strong relationships with strategic partners, potential investors and advisors). With Scott Colvin & Paul Perrett we lay out some key actions you should embed now that can set you up for exit success and also make you a better run business today Big thanks to Bree Fedele 🖋

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Great insights from Adam Agius on what to consider when raising debt for a search fund buyout. Most relevant to the UK market, but a worthwhile read for all searchers. There's more debt capital keen to support search acquisitions than ever before, but approaching it naively can be very costly...

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And this time, it's VIRITECH on the Crowdcube platform. Will I make an #investment? https://lnkd.in/eFvUnmjM Well - again - no :( This is #deeptech. And deeptech requires a few additional considerations. Watch the video to see what I thought at least. But what went wrong is pretty simple. Despite two super reputable and ultra-impressive-sounding founders, I couldn't work out if I could get a return on my investment. Not because my computer/calculator decided to take early retirement—no, no, but because the founders were not transparent with the terms. Yet again - and I urge Crowdcube to advise all projects to consider this - always put the terms of the investment front and center! Be proud of them. Investors should feel it is a privilege to invest in a hot #startup. Sure - in the 'cooling-off' period that happens at the end of each #crowdfund, you get to see the official documents, which will likely detail the terms. But that's only helpful if you already knew you were going to #invest. When you're 'browsing' a #crowdfunding site, the terms should be up front and centre otherwise, like I have just done, the #investor will move on. If I missed it, which I checked again afterwards, then I'm an idiot! But in general, I hope this video helps #founders and investors alike create and review crowdfunding projects. Big love,

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"Funding Collapse sends investment in start-ups to six year low" The Times today covering the shocking stats that VenturePath uncovered, with our partner Beauhurst. Great quotes from supporters Michael Moore CEO, BVCA and Julian David CEO, techUK. * UK VC funding at Series A is -44% from last year, and worsening * Q3 24 is down a staggering 57% from Q2, itself down from Q1 * 9 in 10 seed funded startups cannot access Series A VC funding, the next 'rung on the funding ladder' * Just 32 future scaleup companies across the whole of the UK were able to access their first VC funding round in Q3...a 6 year low * Half a billion less capital is going in to UK scaleups at Series A, than just 2 years ago! As the UK scaleup funding gap widens, we are losing ground against other countries, at both startup stage (a position the UK worked hard to achieve, since 2011), and for scaleup support. OECD data: 13th in the world for scaleup support, and that's before Series A funding access dried up. I get that its confusing. Another report (BBB, Nations & Regions) released this week spoke of positive trends in private investment, stating "The data for Q2 2024 shows that investment value has continued to grow". Great, I love to see optimistic data. But under analysis that bundles venture with private equity (later stage), where a few megadeals skew the numbers. Otherwise the exact opposite is true. Our independent research here, for the UK ScaleUp Investment Mission, is laser beam focussed on Series A. The funding round where companies move from the c.1m startups launched each year, through the 2,179 that access seed funding, into the rarefied category of being recognised as future scaleups, attracting Series A funding (£2-10m). The UK venture landscape is currently funding just 248 pa of these companies, and declining. We've been sharing this urgent call for support with the new Government since the day after the election. I've personally met with several Ministers, and spoke to all the relevant Government departments. I will shamelessly repeat loudly what is at stake. UK scaleup funding at Series A has nearly halved in a year, and continues to decline steeply, more than halving in the last quarter. VenturePath developed The UK ScaleUp Investment Mission to convene the scaleup support ecosystem and £7bn of funders to help address this problem, to improve nationwide access to VC investment, and create more venture-backed successes. We have clear support, clear recommendations to reverse this decline in UK scaleup investment, and have made a clear ask of Government for participation in this, to ensure immediate action is taken to create the conditions for success for UK scaleups, ensuring the focus on growth isn't undermined by lack of capital, or equitable access to it. Government decision makers, we'd love your interest, to progress to action. HM Treasury: Rt Hon Rachel Reeves Spencer Livermore James Murray & CC Poppy Gustafsson (welcome to the debate).

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There's no doubt that sentiment in the market is improving and it feels easier to raise funding than it did a year. At least this side of the pond. But a new report from @wilson sonsini highlighting US/UK venture financing trends and deal terms for first half of this year doesn't show such a great picture with valuations pretty much on hold to their end 2023 levels. Some thawing in capital markets might open up IPO exit opportunities and ungunge the machine. Full report https://buff.ly/4e38UWM

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Emerging GPs📢 We all know it is a difficult time to raise your first (or second) VC Fund.😟 But AlphaQ Venture Capital is here to help you with the Global Allocator Alliance Pitch events and invite-only GP and LP matching Discovery platform.🎌 With an incredible team of Jocke Martelius, Amina Bijedić, Zerina Zimić and Marius Weber, be sure you will get unmatched support when you most need it. Check how they supported our partner Vadim Balashov of US California-based Viaduct Ventures, raising their Fund II.👇 DM me for a warm intro.🤝 ✅ Looking to raise capital for your #VCfund and increase the international pool of your LPs?   🤝 Need warm #LP introductions?   📝 Selling #secondaries to increase liquidity?   🧐 Looking for co-investments (Series A/Series B)?   ▶ G+QUANT's link for inquiries and fund decks: https://lnkd.in/gjC_EuTE   #VentureCapital #VentureFunding #VentureDebt #Fundraising #Innovation #Technology 

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Today we have a superb episode with an absolute legend, Alan Patricof, Co-Founder of Primetime Partners, Greycroft, and Apax Partners. It’s hard to explain just how important Alan has been for tech and VC. He’s one of the true pioneers in venture capital worldwide, having started his first VC firm in the 1970s, Alan Patricof and Associates, which later became Apax Partners and currently has over ~$80Bn AUM. Alan is an inspiring figure, not only because of his success in the business world but also because of his vitality and contagious optimism. He joined us a day after his 90th birthday and candidly, he had more energy than most people I know. We recorded live on stage at Rise, created by Barclays in NYC for the 2024 Gilgamesh Ventures Summit, an annual meeting where we gather over 150 limited partners, founders, investors, and friends for a series of events and discussions about the future of tech and financial services. In this episode, we discuss: - The early days of Venture Capital and Tech in the 1970s and beyond - Alan grew up in NYC and built his career in NY – how was the city back then? - Building primetime partners to invest in the fastest growing market, people over 60 - Staying healthy. How Alan keeps fit, focused and is closing deals at 90 Years Old - Why your reputation is all that matters in this business… and a lot more! Special thanks to Morgan Borer, Jessica Schaefer, Carlee Snyder, Courtney Dawson, and Carina Oriel! https://bit.ly/4g1HNMU

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Episode 353 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Giuseppe Stuto, Co-Founder & Managing Partner of 186 Ventures: https://lnkd.in/eS7CtuS5.  Co-Founded by Giuseppe and Julian Fialkow, 186 Ventures is a pre-seed & seed stage VC firm investing broadly across technology. I kept hearing about the firm, so I was excited to interview Giuseppe for the podcast as they have been out there hustling and have been earning the respect from entrepreneurs and their peers in the VC industry. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * A discussion around the importance of investor & founder alignment. * How a conference at Stanford changed the trajectory of his career into entrepreneurship.  * The full background story of SmakHigh and how they evolved to Fam, the first live group video application for iMessage, including how Jeffrey Bussgang's book - Mastering the VC Game - helped them raise venture funding from Jeff and Flybridge. * The full story of how the acquisition by DraftKings came to fruition. * The details about 186 Ventures and what they are targeting for investments. * The 4 fundamental parts of a business that matter. * The importance of building a repeatable sales model for not only your go-to-market strategy but also how it factors into raising capital. * Why Boston is the best place to build an AI startup. * And so much more. #ai #bostonstartups #startups #venturecapital #entrepreneurship

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LOOKING FOR INVESTMENT ? Please submit via this link: 👉 https://lnkd.in/eKR-32P6 Fuel Ventures is one of the most active early-stage venture capital funds in the UK, established by 🚀 Mark Pearson as a result of his own entrepreneurial and investment successes. Mark built and exited his own digital marketplace business founded in 2006 and sold in 2014 for £55m, in parallel invested in and exited a number of personal angel investments including being the first investor into Paddle now valued at $1.4billion and has since established a portfolio of some of the most exciting early and growth-stage tech companies, which included a recent successful exit to Adobe. 5 exits and counting... They focus on fast growth Software (SaaS), Marketplaces, Fintech platforms and eCommerce businesses investing in the early stages. Since its incorporation, Fuel Ventures has created an impressive portfolio of 160+ technology companies. The Fuel Ventures team, investor, and advisor network provides a unique 'all under one roof' approach based on real-world experience which minimises the level of risk for the fuel companies, delivering a combination of mentorship, experience and access to the investment required to accelerate their revenue growth through strategic advice and practical business-planning and operational execution support. They look for super ambitious hard-working founders or founding teams, companies that have large global scale growth potential with multibillion market opportunities. They really want to see companies that have the potential to deliver x100 potential growth, mostly meaning £1billion+ future market cap potential. Their Funds: 👉 Concept/Pre-Seed 👉 Seed & Seed+ 👉 Pre-A & A Stage SUBMIT YOUR BUSINESS FOR INVESTMENT 👉 https://lnkd.in/eKR-32P6

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