James Wise

As syndicated with the Daily Telegraph Do you know how much salt you should eat for lunch? Neither do I, but thankfully, the introduction of food standards and clearer information on labels means that many consumers can easily judge a food’s salt content without requiring a chemistry degree. Food

Syndicated in The Sunday Telegraph London’s tech-friendly mayor last week turned up at South by Southwest, the annual celebration of new technologies in Austin, Texas, with some party-pooping words for the big platforms. This year Sadiq Khan became the first British politician to make a speech at the conference,

As published in Venturebeat.com, December 2017 Sixty years after the first Ford Model T rolled off the production line, Congress passed a law requiring the installation of seat belts to address public safety concerns. Many auto manufacturer lobbyists claimed this would be the end of the U.S. car

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,

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

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 home of

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

In my lifetime, British politics has never felt so divided. From a nation-splitting referendum, to political turmoil amongst our top representatives, it is easy to feel helpless in the face of national and global events. But despite blogs laden with feelings of alienation from the political process, there are many

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.

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

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 new funds, it’s not feasible

This piece was syndicated with City AM. I am also an investor in Crowdcube, a crowdfunding platform. Venture investors on competitive deals are used to missing out to other funds. It’s part and parcel of the industry. But last month, tech-focused VCs missed out to the crowd, as the

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

An interview with Bram & Brian, the founders of 3DHubs, the first company I backed @Balderton.

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

Live pitch from day at COS London

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

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 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 burn rates,

Today we're excited to announce our $5m investment in Sunrise.am, the calendar designed to make your life a little easier. Sunrise isn't only about managing your time, it is, perhaps more importantly, also about context. Like many professions, a big part of our job in

There is plenty of content on how to win over investors and raise capital for your company. However, investments come with investors – whether they be arms length angels or active board members. And after all the hard work of getting these people’s money, I’ve seen many entrepreneurs struggle

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In the pitches we see, founders tend to sum up the main strength of their business in a single, heavily gesticulated sentence: ‘the product is just awesome’ Product is central to the success of any business, and design is in the midst of an important resurgence. All the start-ups we