Accel, a first partner to exceptional teams everywhere, announced that it has raised a €602.7 million early-stage fund to support ambitious founders building global category-defining companies out of Europe and Israel. Now in its 24th year on the ground in Europe, Accel’s eighth early-stage fund will build on the strategy of previous funds as the team continues to partner with transformative European and Israeli enterprise and consumer technology companies at the earliest stages. The firm leverages its 40-year history and global platform to help its European and Israeli companies scale and win worldwide.
When Accel opened its London office in 2000, Europe’s technology ecosystem was nascent and the region was far from an obvious choice to build an on-the-ground team. While many questioned Europe’s ability to generate billion dollar outcomes, Accel believed that ambitious founders could come from anywhere. Accel became one of the first Silicon Valley venture firms to set up a European team and secure a front row seat to the evolution of the region’s technology landscape.
“Finding, building relationships and partnering with exceptional founders regardless of where they are located has always been in our DNA,” said Harry Nelis, Partner at Accel. “Our belief almost 25 years ago that Europe and Israel’s entrepreneurs had the vision and ambition to create global, category-defining companies has ensured we’ve been fortunate enough to partner with many of the region’s iconic companies over several technology cycles. These companies have laid the foundations of the thriving landscape we see today, fuelling and inspiring the next wave of founders who can now see what’s possible. Our capillary networks cultivated over more than two decades ensure our team has a deep knowledge of the region. With Europe and Israel producing exceptional talent in areas such as AI, cybersecurity, fintech and the modern data stack, we’re looking forward to supporting the next generation of founders.”
Since then, Europe saw its first unicorn in 2005 (Skype), decacorn in 2016 (Supercell) and cloud decacorn in 2020 (UiPath), and the ecosystem has continued to gather pace. Today, the region is a powerhouse of talent, innovation and ambition.
Some numbers confirm this: The European and Israeli VC market is now around half the size of that of the US (44%), with approximately $66B invested in 2023 vs the US’ $150B (Dealroom). This is in stark contrast to the $1.1B invested in Europe and Israel in 2003 (Dealroom). There are now 360+ VC-backed European and Israeli-founded unicorns (Dealroom). Former unicorn employees have fuelled more than 1,400 new tech-enabled startups across the regions. Across Europe and Israel, Accel has now backed 200+ companies across more than 60 cities and 20 countries, including places such as Lithuania, Portugal, Romania and Serbia that are outside of the region’s familiar tech hubs. Of any venture capital firm, Accel has invested in the most European and Israeli-founded unicorns at the Series A stage (Dealroom)
Europe now has a wealth of success stories that are providing the all-important role models for the next generation of entrepreneurs. These include Accel portfolio companies in Finland (Supercell), France (BlaBlaCar, Doctolib, Shift Technology, Sorare), Germany (Celonis, Check24, Personio, sennder, Trade Republic), Israel (Cyera, Melio, Snyk), Lithuania (Vinted), Norway (ForgeRock), Sweden (Avito, Spotify), Romania (UiPath), and the UK (GoCardless, Monzo, Synthesia, Zepz).
Accel’s recent investments across Europe and Israel include Cyera, Filigran, Lottie, Oasis, Synthesia and Viso.
Read the orginal article: https://www.eu-startups.com/2024/05/accel-raises-new-e602-7-million-fund-to-back-ambitious-early-stage-founders-across-europe-and-israel/
