Depop joins Etsy in a $1.63B acquisition As shared on Balderton.com Etsy, which operates two-sided online marketplaces that connect millions of passionate and creative buyers and sellers around the world, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Depop for $1.625 billion. Following the closing of the transaction, Depop will continue to be headquartered in
Protolabs acquires 3D Hubs to build the world's largest distributed manufacturing platform Today we're happy to announce that 3D Hubs, a Balderton portfolio company, has been acquired by Protolabs in a deal worth $330M in cash and shares. Amsterdam-based 3D Hubs [https://www.3dhubs.com/] was founded with a single goal in mind, to connect designers and manufacturers to
Tibber and the future of home energy consumption Home energy consumption is amongst the most critical industries in the world. It provides us with access to the fundamental necessities in life from heating to refrigeration, but at the same time contributes to 20% of the West’s Green House Gas Emissions (GHGs). It also makes up between 11%
Building, sustainably As run on TechCrunch, April 2020 Marc Andreessen, Florence Nightingale and Building in a Vacuum. If you want to get a structural engineer excited, ask them what they could build in space. Freed from the constraints of gravity and aerodynamics, a single human could move skyscrapers like lego bricks. A
Cracking the City Code This was a guest edit of the exceptional Exponential View [https://www.exponentialview.co/], a weekly series of essays and podcasts run by Azeem Azhar. Challenging the power structures of megacities Hi, I’m James. I feel particularly fortunate that Azeem asked me to contribute to Exponential View this week
Our investment in Kaia Health: how software can tackle chronic pain Working in technology, you see plenty of graphs. But one graph bothers me more above all of them: While new markets, practices and technologies have seen the cost of many goods fall over the last few decades, healthcare has remained stubbornly expensive. And even more worryingly, the length and quality
Announcing Sophia Genetic's new funding round After a very strong 2018 for our portfolio company Sophia Genetics, in which they achieved many technical and commercial firsts, we are happy to announce our participation in their latest $77M funding round, led by Al Gore's Generation IM and supported by IdInvest. As we noted in our
The Government's tax on tech is the right diagnosis, but the wrong prescription As published in The Telegraph 10th November 2018 While the last year has been one of the most successful ever for the UK’s fast-growing tech sector on the international stage, the industry has also faced a ferocious backlash at home. From the disgraceful conduct at Cambridge Analytica to
How to make calls with us useful Your time is your most important asset, so to make the most of calls or first meetings with Balderton we have a few recommendations of how to prepare in advance, things we've learned from looking at over 5,000 pitch decks a year. 1) Everyone at Balderton is
How online could be the high street’s saviour, not its executioner **As syndicated in the Telegraph url:https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/07/11/online-high-streets-saviour-not-executioner/ ** Vincent Van Doodle doesn’t sound like a rival to Marks & Spencer for retail space. In years gone by the Birmingham-based company might have sold its bespoke
Conferences are quiet on the UK's start-up nation Syndicated in the Sunday Telegraph 'Voice of Business' section The party conference season has finally ended and despite some grand plans put forward, notably a national house building scheme, the technology sector felt overlooked this year in a way it hasn’t been for decades. In the past,
Why we’ve invested in Sophia Genetics ( and why the world is obsessed with your genome) TL:DR Genetics is a software problem, and there’s plenty of problems to be solved Today I’m happy to announce we are leading an investment of $30m in SOPHiA Genetics. SOPHiA has developed a platform used by over 300 hospitals and 1000s of clinicians globally, to help diagnose
Start-up President Macron lays claim to Europe’s technology crown As published in The Sunday Times, 25th June 2017 This week President Macron spelled out his vision of France as a country that “thinks and moves like a start-up”. The President, whose own meteoric rise resembles that of a Silicon Valley start-up, claimed that France would become the
The European Talent Landscape - Report Today we are proud to unveil 'The European Talent Landscape', and I am delighted to be on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt to reveal the findings. You can view the full report and key findings here [http://talent.balderton.com] In this report, we’ve set out to identify
Podcast: When VCs need to be general and when they need to be special, with the TwentyMinuteVC 20VC: Listen to Europe's youngest venture partner James Wise on the future of the VC industry in Europe here [http://hwcdn.libsyn.com/p/f/f/2/ff2faa5956928f92/160_20VC__James_Wise_Partner__Balderton_Capital.mp3?c_id=11549730&expiration=1467985811&hwt=e76d1d56007facb37237b6028aaa3aac] http://www.thetwentyminutevc.
European tech in 2015, and the future of the Class of '15 The European ‘Series A’ crunch is gone, so what does the future hold for the Class of ‘15? After years of complaints about there being a ‘Series A’ crunch, Europe has resolutely turned a corner with a reported 338 of the 1,000+ venture deals in Europe this year being
Dealing with investors without losing your mind This is a follow-up post to ‘The Funding Round is Dead’ [http://https://medium.com/@jp_wise/the-funding-round-is-dead-a7d453c35c23] As capital becomes a commodity in early stage tech investing, founders face increasing inbound contact from angels and venture investors. But with a record number of
The Funding Round is Dead When reading about Tilt’s latest funding round, I was struck by a quote that currently epitomises the venture industry. > “We weren’t in fundraising mode — there was strong outside interest with minimal dilution, and Khaled and I felt like it was the right move for the business,” Tilt
3DHubs, from Dutch garage to global platform (podcast) An interview with Bram & Brian, the founders of 3DHubs, the first company I backed @Balderton.
Interview with The Twenty Minute VC (podcast) See more of what the young Harry Stebbings is doing to make investment more transparent here: http://www.thetwentyminutevc.com/ 20 mins podcast with Harry Stebbings and James Wise
The Tangled Web of Venture Investing A rather odd question was recently put to me on twitter. I was asked who I hated most in the ecosystem of London tech investors. I know that you shouldn’t take much on twitter seriously, but part of this question spoke to a more commonly held misconception. Many entrepreneurs
The hard thing about hard things in healthtech Today we announced our investment in MyTomorrows, a platform which provides very sick patients access to drugs and treatments at trial stage that could, in theory, hugely improve or even save their lives. This is a simple description of a truly radical platform ( you should read more about them here
Apple Pay, Europe and Fintech - Bloomberg Interview Bloomberg interview the day after Apple's Q4 earnings report, discussing the future of the iPhone, Apple Pay and the European technology ecosystem
How to avoid the $100m burn How to avoid the $100m burn In the last few days there have been a number of concerned posts on the rising burn rate of technology start-ups flush with venture-led cash. Bill Gurley, general partner at Benchmark worries that companies are taking on excessive risk with such high
