Startups in Europe raised €23.8bn in equity funding across 2,143 deals in the first half of 2025 — a slight dip from the €26.95bn raised during the same period last year.
If overall funding was down, there were still many big bets: Sifted counted 46 megarounds (€100m+), putting the continent on pace to match or surpass 2024’s tally of 94.
What’s striking about this year’s biggest raises is how closely they track both investor conviction and technological urgency. Healthtech stands out with four of the ten largest rounds, where investors are driven by three key shifts: rising pressure on healthcare systems to reduce long-term costs through prevention, the accelerating adoption of AI to streamline everything from diagnosis to drug discovery and a consumer-driven move toward proactive health management.
AI is a central theme — be it data centres or battlefield tech. London-based Isomorphic Labs’s raise reflects growing confidence that generative AI can transform drug development, particularly in oncology. Investors are also pouring money into the infrastructure needed to power that shift: Sweden’s EcoDataCenter secured one of the year’s largest rounds to expand capacity for energy-hungry AI workloads.
The largest equity rounds in H1:
1/ Helsing — €600m Series D
The four-year-old defence AI startup raised €600m in June at a €12bn valuation—more than doubling its €5bn price tag from just a year ago. The round was led by Spotify cofounder Daniel Ek’s investment firm Prima Materia, with backing from Accel, Lightspeed, Plural, General Catalyst and Swedish defence giant Saab.
Initially focused solely on battlefield AI software, Helsing pivoted at the end of 2024 to also build autonomous strike drones, and recently unveiled an underwater surveillance system. It’s raised €1.36bn to date.
2/ Isomorphic Labs — $600m
The AI drug discovery startup, which spun out of Google DeepMind in 2021, raised its first external funding in March: a $600m round led by Thrive Capital, with participation from Alphabet and GV (formerly Google Ventures). The company speeds up drug discovery by applying DeepMind’s AlphaFold tech — which predicts how proteins interact with other molecules — to a broader range of biological targets.
The company was founded by DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis who, alongside AlphaFold creator John Jumper, won the 2024 Nobel Prize in chemistry for the breakthrough. Isomorphic plans to bring its AI-designed oncology drugs to clinical trials by year-end, and has signed multi-billion-dollar research partnerships with pharma giants Eli Lilly and Novartis.
3/ EcoDataCenter — €450m
The Swedish data centres company raised €450m in March via its owner Areim. The company opened its first data centre in 2019 and has since been focusing on sustainable infrastructure, serving clients like carmaker BMW and AI company DeepL. In 2024, EcoDataCenter partnered with AI hyperscaler CoreWeave to build one of Europe’s largest AI clusters in the Swedish city Falun, doubling down on demand for energy-efficient, high-performance computing.
4/ Green Flexibility — €400m
Founded by the team behind Europe’s first virtual power plant, Germany-based Green Flexibility is building on a decade of experience to scale large-scale battery systems that stabilise the grid and support the energy transition. Its €400m raise in January by Partners Group will help meet increasing demand for grid flexibility across Europe.
5/ Verdiva Bio — $410m Series A
London-based Verdiva Bio emerged from stealth in January with a $410m raise: Europe’s second-largest ever Series A. The round was co-led by Forbion and General Atlantic, with participation from RA Capital, OrbiMed, Logos Capital, Lilly Asia Ventures and Lyfe Capital. Founded just months earlier, the clinical-stage biotech is developing oral and injectable treatments for obesity, cardiometabolic disorders and related complications.
6/ Skynrg — €300m
The Amsterdam-based sustainable aviation fuel provider secured €300m in May led by APG, the asset manager for Dutch pension giant ABP, with backing from Macquarie Asset Management. The capital will fuel construction of three large-scale plants across Europe and North America, potentially a big step toward making clean jet fuel a commercial reality.
7/ Neko Health — $260m Series B
Swedish healthtech Neko Health raised a $260m Series B in January, vaulting the startup to unicorn status with a $1.8bn valuation. The round was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from General Catalyst, O.G. Venture Partners, Rosello, Lakestar and Atomico.
Cofounded in 2018 by Hjalmar Nilsonne and Spotify’s Daniel Ek after an exchange of messages on X when it was still called Twitter, the pair spent six years quietly building a vertically integrated, preventative healthcare model — despite neither having a background in medicine. Its £299 full-body scan maps millions of internal and external data points in minutes, and the company says demand is already outpacing capacity.
8/ Amboss — €240m
Berlin-based medical library Amboss raised €240m in March, led by Kirkbi, M&G Investments and Lightrock, with existing backers Partech and Project A also participating. Its platform gives medical students and healthcare professionals study material for medical licensing and national board exams.
In 2024, the company expanded its reach with two strategic acquisitions: Novaheal, an edtech startup focused on nursing education, and Nejm Knowledge+, a clinician-focused learning and assessment platform from the New England Journal of Medicine’s publisher.
9/ Auro — €220m
Spain’s Auro Travel raised €220m in funding in March, with ride-hailing company Uber acquiring a 30% stake. The deal positions Auro as a growing challenger to Cabify, Spain’s long-time vehicle hire leader.
10/ TravelPerk — $200m Series E
Barcelona-based TravelPerk hit a $2.7bn valuation after raising a $200m Series E in January led by Atomico, with new investors Sequoia Capital and EQT Growth participating. Less than a year after a $104m Series D extension from Kinnevik, SoftBank and Felix Capital, the Spanish startup is doubling down on US expansion and boosting its platform with the acquisition of Swiss spend management startup Yokoy. The startup offers an “all-in-one” business travel platform that handles booking, expense tracking and spend management.
Read the orginal article: https://sifted.eu/articles/10-largest-equity-rounds-in-h1-2025/
