Europe’s tech scene is booming to the tune of $5.7B in funding in 2014 up 78% YoY. With the funding and deal momentum, we looked at the pace at which early-stage startups were raising money between rounds, specifically from Seed to A and from A to B.
We found that the median time between raising a Seed round and Series A increased YoY to 465 days (~15 months) in 2014. Time between Series A and Series B rounds also are up from their 2012 figures increasing from 504 in 2012 to 569 days between rounds in 2014 (~19 months). Both figures are significantly higher than their US counterparts, which were 349 days from Seed to A and 441 days from A to B in 2014.
One quick way to see if a company has momentum is to see if they’re Financing Velocity is high – in other words, were they able to quickly raise their next round of financing? The logic, of course, being that hot companies raise rounds quickly because investors want in on them as the result of traction (user/customer growth, revenues, etc).
Specifically we looked at companies which most quickly raised a Series A round after their seed round in Europe. The fast-raising companies include Azimo, a company disrupting Western Union and the remittances space, as well as BAT Household Services, a German version of TaskRabbit and Homejoy, which raised a $5M Series A less than 6 months after their Seed round.
The full list below.
| Company | Industry | Country | Series A Raised ($M) | Select Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seriously Digital Entertainment | Gaming | Finland | 10 | Daher Capital, Sunstone Capital, Upfront ventures |
| Purplebricks | Real Estate | United Kingdom | 11.7 | DN Capital |
| Flypay | Payments | United Kingdom | 1.66 | Entrée Capital |
| BAT Household Services | Home Furnishings | Germany | 5 | DN Capital, German Startups Group, Target Ventures |
| Azimo | Payments | United Kingdom | 10 | e.ventures, Frontier Investments Group, Greycroft Partners |
| Property Partner | Real Estate | United Kingdom | 15.42 | Octopus Ventures, Index Ventures, Seedcamp |
| Adbrain | Advertising, Sales & Marketing | United Kingdom | 7.5 | Notion Capital, Octopus Ventures |
| PrivateGriffe | Marketplace | Italy | 3.45 | Ad4Ventures, AngeLab, VAM Funds |
| Lesara | Discount eCommerce | Germany | 7 | Partech Ventures, Paua Ventures, Simile Venture Partners |
| ByHours | Travel | Spain | 3.6 | Caixa Capital Risc, Fons d’Enginyers, Axon Partners Group |
In addition to looking at fast-raising Series A stage companies, we also looked at the Series B stage companies who made the leap from A to B quickest since 2014. This includes Netherlands-based payments company Adyen, which raised a massive $250M Series B round from Felicis Ventures, General Atlantic, Index Ventures and Temasek Holdings, as well as AirBnB alternative, Homestay Technologies. In fact, of the 10 companies, 4 have similar business models to successful US companies including Cabify (Uber/Lyft alternative), Deliveroo (Postmates), and Helpling (Handybook/Homejoy), in addition to Homestay.
| Company | Industry | Country | Series B Raised ($M) | Select Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| helpling | Marketplace | Germany | 47 | Kite Ventures; Lakestar; Lukasz Gadowski; Rocket Internet |
| KnCMiner | Computer Hardware | Sweden | 15 | Accel Partners; Creandum; GP BullHound Sidecar |
| Homestay Technologies | Travel | Ireland | 3 | Delta Partners; Enterprise Ireland |
| Cabify | Travel (mobile) | Spain | 4 | Black Vine; Seaya Ventures |
| Adyen | Payments | Netherlands | 250 | Felicis Ventures; General Atlantic; Index Ventures; Temasek Holdings |
| Deliveroo | Food & Grocery | United Kingdom | 25 | Accel Partners; Hoxton Ventures; Hummingbird Ventures; Index Ventures |
| Fuse | Application & Data Integration | Norway | 2.8 | Alliance Venture; Northzone Ventures |
| Vinted | Apparel & Accessories | Lithuania | 27 | Accel Partners; Insight Venture Partners |
| Cortexica Visual Systems | Search | United Kingdom | 3.45 | Imperial Innovations |
| GoCardless | Payments | United Kingdom | 7 | Accel Partners; Balderton Capital; Passion Capital |
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Image credit: Taxcredits.org // Flickr