bunch, a German tech platform enabling investors to syndicate deals across private markets, has secured €7.3M in a seed round of funding led by European early-stage fund Cherry Ventures.
embedded/capital, who led bunch’s previously undisclosed pre-seed round, also participated. Further, numerous angel investors, such as founders of European fintechs like Adyen, Klarna, Juni, and Moonfare, private market investment, and fintech experts such as Cristina Stenbeck, Pip Klöckner, and Jan Deepen’s Discovery Ventures, participated.
How will the funding be used?
bunch intends to use the capital towards expanding across additional geographies and asset classes. Also, the team will continue to advance its holistic software platform’s technical and product development to make it easier for all investors to participate in private markets.
While private market investments have exploded over the last decade with almost $10 trillion in assets under management, according to McKinsey, the value creation was limited to only those with access to opportunities and large amounts of capital.
Berlin-based bunch helps remove the barriers of investing collectively, diversifying risk, and democratizing access to unique investment opportunities.
bunch was started of frustration from this by founders Enrico Ohnemüller and Levent Altunel in late 2021.
Creating investment syndicates
bunch’s initial offering is a digital platform where investors can create their investment syndicates and track all their investments in one place. Over the last three months, they have transacted close to €150 million of assets under admin across startup investments and funds.
“Investors have been waiting for a solution like this that takes away all the admin work of investing and helps investors to become more professional at the same time,” says Levent, who also highlights that first users have joined as investors in this funding round.
The bunch OS is an asset & jurisdiction agnostic investment platform, enabling investors to set up and seamlessly manage their investment entities while at the same time offering investors more professional tools. The bunch OS is currently in a public beta.
Enrico adds: “We are giving our customers access to a toolset that previously was only available for the largest private investors, including pro-rata monetisation protecting dilution on your winners and risk diversification through collective investing. In addition, we are building on top of larger tech organisations for scalability, which allows us to focus on customer value and process flexibility from day one.
Filip Dames, Founding Partner at Cherry Ventures, says, “The bunch team, led by Levent and Enrico, is unlocking private markets for investing with, first, their one-stop-shop solution — the bunch OS. We know how cumbersome gaining access to these markets can be, so we were immediately impressed when we witnessed bunch’s streamlined, simple solution. We believe this tool is the first step on the journey to provide liquidity to private markets and become a true operating system for investors. We’re thrilled that this round will further revolutionise how all private market stakeholders — founders and funders — invest, interact, and exchange.”
Ramin Niroumand, the managing partner at embedded/capital, says, “We know from our experience as founders, operators, and investors that private markets are far from digitised, with limited liquidity and fragmented access contributing to a generally painful process for all market participants. So when we first started our conversations with Enrico and Levent last year, we collectively saw the potential of building on existing fintech infrastructure to launch a holistic suite of financial products across jurisdictions and assets – the bunch OS – to transform the way we interact with private markets. We are thrilled to be part of the bunch’s journey from the very beginning, as well as happy customers.”
