Accel, a global venture capital fund, has today announced a new $650 million early-stage fund to support ambitious founders building global category-defining companies from Europe and Israel.
The VC firm has been active in Europe for over two decades and this recent fund is its eighth early-stage fund committed to the region.
Accel’s latest fund will build on the strategy of previous funds. It comes at a time when the team continues to partner with transformative European and Israeli enterprise and consumer technology companies at the earliest stages.
Accel expects to invest in between 25 and 30 companies from its latest early-stage fund.
VC trend in Europe and Israel
As per Dealroom, the Europe and Israeli VC market is around 44% of that of the US with nearly $66 billion invested in 2023 in these regions against the $150 billion investment in the US. There are over 360 VC-backed European and Israeli-founded unicorns as well.
Of these, it is said that Accel has backed over 200 companies across 60 cities and 20 countries, including Lithuania, Portugal, Romania and Serbia. The interesting fact is these countries are outside of the region’s familiar tech hubs. In addition to this, Accel has invested in the most European and Israeli-founded unicorns at the Series A stage.
Revolutionised European startup ecosystem
Accel, formerly known as Accel Partners, is one of the first Silicon Valley venture firms to set up a European team. Also, it is among the frontrunners that contributed to the evolution of the European tech ecosystem. 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.
Portfolio of investments
Accel’s portfolio of investments in Europe include:
- 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
- UK: GoCardless, Monzo, Synthesia, Zepz
“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.”
