Spanish venture capital firm Seaya is opening an office in London after raising €600 million ($637 million) for a new fund focused on European startups. Vinoth Jayakumar will join Seaya as a managing partner in London to help run the new fund, called Seaya Nova, the company said in a statement Thursday. Jayakumar and Seaya co-founder and managing partner Beatriz González will jointly run Nova from London and Madrid, along with a team of eight investors.
Seaya Nova raised €600 million in its first closing, with backing from the European Union's Tech Champions Initiative, which pledged half of the total, along with institutional investors and family offices. The fund roughly doubles Seaya's assets under management, to about €1.2 billion. The ETCI was created in 2023 by the European Investment Bank and five EU member states to foster investments and scale up growth for European companies in sectors such as AI, fintech and life sciences. As of Sept. 30, the fund has invested €3.9 billion in 51 companies, including 15 so-called unicorns.
Seaya's new fund, which is registered in Spain, will look to invest in a variety of companies including industrial firms, fintechs, and what it calls the commerce sectors, which includes retail and hospitality among others, González said. At its founding in 2013, Seaya focused mainly on early-stage startups. Among its notable investments are Spanish ride-hailing company Cabify, in which it remains an investor, and delivery-app firm Glovo, which was sold to Delivery Hero in 2022. It also invested in Clicars, Housfy and Filmin.
"Seaya Nova is the natural evolution of what we have built over 13 years," González said in a statement. Banco Santander SA bought a stake in Seaya in 2024 as part of its expansion into alternative assets. As of Dec. 31, the stake was 25%. Jayakumar was previously a partner at Molten Ventures, where he invested in companies including Revolut and Iceye.
Source: Bloomberg Markets · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing