Sifted - Mubadala's Europe team: Who's who?

Good morning there,

Abi Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala has hundreds of billions worth of assets under management, is one of the most active gulf investors in European tech and counts companies like Klarna, Revolut, Flink and Getir in its portfolio. But despite that, its team here isn’t that well known... so editor Amy Lewin and senior reporter Freya Pratty decided to find out who’s who.

Elsewhere today, senior reporter Zosia Wanat sits down with Philippe Tibi, the brains behind a plan to get big institutional private investors to become LPs and start investing in French tech. Since it was launched in 2019, €13bn has been pledged to back startups and scaleups. She asks whether he can replicate the plan elsewhere in Europe. 

Plus:

• French healthtech Alan raises €173m Series F at €4bn valuation
• Spain's All Iron Ventures rebrands and announces closing of third fund, at €150m 

— Tom Nugent, newsletter editor

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🇫🇷 French healthtech unicorn Alan has raised a €173m Series F and increased its valuation to €4bn.

• Belgian bank and insurer Belfius led the latest round and was joined by existing investors including Canadian pension fund Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), Temasek, Coatue and Lakestar.
• Belfius and Alan have also signed a distribution partnership meaning that the healthtech will be able to offer its services to the Belgian bank’s corporate and institutional clients. This represents “millions” of employees, according to Alan. Over time, Alan will also provide coverage to Belfius’s 7,000 employees.
• Alan’s governance remains unchanged, according to the company, with cofounders Jean-Charles Samuelian-Werve and Charles Gorintin and employees remaining the largest shareholders — with 40% of the capital and the majority of voting rights.
• The company told Sifted in February that it had no plans to raise more. It was last valued at €2.7bn when it raised a €183m Series E in 2022.

💰 Bilbao, Spain-based All Iron Ventures is rebranding to Acurio Ventures, as it today announces it has closed its third fund, of €150m, to invest in European startups. LPs include “one of the largest and most prestigious US university endowments”.

• The firm says closing the fund was helped by the track record of previous vehicles — it says its first fund, which it launched in 2020, has already returned its initial capital, delivering an IRR of more than 40%, and that its second fund is “placed comfortably in the top quartile.”

👀 Lithuanian payments fintech kevin — which raised more than $65m from big name investors like Accel and Eurazeo — has been declared insolvent by the Vilnius District Court, according to reporting from 15min. 

• The news follows reporting from Sifted that kevin had failed to pay its staff for two months, with current and former employees claiming that the situation was mishandled.

🇸🇪 Northvolt lenders have selected investment bank PJT Partners to help advise on options as the battery manufacturer is running out of cash, according to Bloomberg, which cites people familiar with the matter. The report says that while there are no restructuring talks under way, PJT will work alongside law firm Milbank LLP, as creditors prepare for a range of scenarios, sources said. Its largest shareholders haven’t yet disclosed whether they'll inject fresh capital into the company.

• Northvolt, which has faced challenges with its production, told Bloomberg Friday that it had produced a record 60k cells at its Skellefteå site the week before, a threefold increase since the start of the year.

🇩🇪 After a turbulent summer for insurtech Wefox, the company has appointed a new CEO: Joachim Müller, former Group CEO and chairman of the board of Allianz Global Corporate and Speciality SE.

💰 Since 2019, French economics professor Philippe Tibi has been the mastermind behind an initiative that has seen some of the country’s biggest institutional investors — mostly insurance companies — commit to invest a total €13bn in tech companies. 

• Dubbed the ‘Tibi initiative’, the programme sees the government act as an intermediary between these investors, which are not typically used to investing in tech, and VCs that are seeking private funding.
• €6.4bn was deployed between 2019 and 2023 — and Tibi is now planning to share notes with other European countries to encourage the emergence of similar initiatives outside of France. Sifted’s CEE correspondent Zosia Wanat sat down with him during his visit to Warsaw.

💸 Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala is among the most deep-pocketed investors backing European tech, with $302bn in assets under management. 

• It has some of Europe’s biggest and most closely-watched tech companies in its portfolio, including Klarna and, as of this summer, Revolut — buying a stake as part of the fintech’s $500m employee share sale in August. Last week it also reinvested in speedy grocery startup Flink. 
• Yet, despite being such a significant investor in some of Europe’s best-known companies, Mubadala — and its team — aren’t so well-known. Amy Lewin and Freya Pratty tracked down 11 of them based in Europe.

🗣️ How to manage burnout — serial entrepreneur Emma Obanye shares her tips for founders. 

• Emma is also speaking about this topic at the Sifted Summit. If you’ve not got a ticket yet you can get one here.

🌌 Shoot for the stars: It turns out celebrity angels do impact a startup's success. (Sponsored by ESADE)

🛫 Mapped: Europe’s aviation startup sector, and beyond (Sponsored by Groupe ADP)

German tech unicorns are a hotbed for new startups in the country, according to a new report by Morphais VC. It found:

• 65 new startups were founded between January and July 2024 which had links to one of Germany’s 32 unicorns. 
• Two-thirds of the startups come from five unicorns: Zalando, Delivery Hero, Celonis, Enpal and Razor Group. The 15 startups spawned by Zalando (23.1% of the total) is the most of any unicorn.
• One third are still in stealth, but of those that have been identified as belonging to a certain sector, fintech, data & analytics, HR tech, clean tech and construction tech are the most popular.

Last week to apply for Sifted’s Eastern Europe & Baltics Leaderboard! 

Don’t miss out on gaining unparalleled exposure and credibility for your startup by featuring on our ranking of the fastest-growing startups in the region.

Meet the whole team of Sifted journalists at the Sifted Summit next week — along with many of Europe's smartest founders and investors. Get your ticket now before they're all snapped up!

London-based Datamaran, an ESG decision making platform, raised €29.5m in Series C funding led by Morgan Stanley.

London-based Ferovinum, a platform for the drinks industry which helps businesses fund, produce, procure and sell to global wine and spirits markets, raised £17.5m in Series A funding. Notion Capital led the round and was joined by investors including Shapers VC and Semapa Next. Notion’s Jos White joined the company’s board.

Madrid-based Tuio, an insurtech platform, raised €15m in funding from investors including MassMutual Ventures, BlackRock, Bamcap Ventures and Extension Fund.

Oxford, UK-based FluoRok, which is developing novel fluorochemical reagents and battery electrolyte salts, raised £7.7m in funding. BGF led the round and was joined by investors including Green Generation Fund, Volta Energy Technologies and Oxford Science Enterprises. The company is a spinout from the University of Oxford.

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