Balderton Capital Last updated August 29, 2025 British venture capital firm
Balderton Capital is a venture capital firm based in London , UK, that invests in early and growth stage, technology and internet startup companies in Europe. It is considered to be among the four-biggest venture capital firms in the English capital. [ 1]
History Founded in 2000 as Benchmark Capital Europe, Balderton Capital became fully independent in 2007. [ 2] [ 3] The company made over 100 early-stage investments between 2000 and 2020, including Revolut , Betfair , The Hut Group , MySQL , Yoox , Depop , Talend, Recorded Future , NaturalMotion , Kobalt Music Group , GoCardless , CityMapper , Wayve, and Sophia Genetics .
Funding In November 2019, Balderton announced Balderton VII, a new $400m fund to invest in European companies at Series A. [ 10] The new fund will reportedly make approximately 12 investments annually. [ 11] In 2018, Balderton announced the first fund dedicated to buying equity from existing shareholders of European technology startups. [ 12] In 2021, Balderton announced the first fund dedicated to growth, with $680M under management and a further $600M for early stage investing, bringing its total assets to over $5B. [ 13] [ 14]
Investments Notable investments have included:
Exits Since 2008, Balderton has had many prominent exits, including Betfair ($2bn IPO of which they owned 3.95%), [ 25] Bebo ($850m sale to AOL), [ 26] Depop ( sale to Etsy for $1.65B ), [ 27] Scansafe (sale to Cisco , 30% stake [ 28] ), Lovefilm (sale to Amazon.com , 5% stake [ 29] ), Yoox ($700m IPO), MySQL ($1bn sale to Sun Microsystems , 15% stake [ 30] ), Big Fish Games (sold to Churchill Downs for $885m), [ 17] Recorded Future ($780m sale to Insight Partners , [ 31] Sunrise (sold to Microsoft ), [ 32] Talend (2016, Nasdaq IPO at $1.5B), Sophia Genetics ( 2021, Nasdaq IPO at $1.2B), Darktrace (2021, FTSE IPO at $3.5B ), Frontier Car Group (majority bought by OLX in 2019 for $700M), [ 33] and Magic Pony Technologies (sold to Twitter ). [ 34] [ 35]
References ↑ "Balderton Capital raises new $400M fund to back European tech startups at Series A" . TechCrunch . 12 November 2019. Retrieved 2020-04-09 . ↑ Loukili, Khadija (10 June 2021). "Balderton Raises $680 Million Growth Fund To Help European Tech Compete Globally" . Rabo Frontier Ventures . ↑ "Benchmark Europe declares independence; now "Balderton Capital" " . VentureBeat . 2007-06-07. Retrieved 2022-05-17 . ↑ Bradshaw, Tim (15 June 2008). "Liautaud joins Balderton Capital" . Financial Times . Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ Li, Charmaine (17 October 2013). "Balderton Capital hires Wellington Partners' Daniel Waterhouse" . venturevillage.eu . Archived from the original on 2 August 2014. Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ "Suranga Chandratillake joins Balderton Capital as GP" . Thomson Reuters . 20 January 2014. Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ Uber executive joins London venture capital firm Balderton - Telegraph ↑ Balderton Capital Promotes Rob Moffat And James Wise To Partner | TechCrunch ↑ Weil, Dan (5 February 2020). "Goldman Sachs Partner in Technology Investments, Rana Yared, Leaves Firm" . TheStreet . Retrieved 2020-02-07 . ↑ "Balderton Capital raises new $400M fund to back European tech startups at Series A" . TechCrunch . 12 November 2019. Retrieved 2019-11-24 . ↑ Browne, Ryan (2019-11-12). "A new $400 million tech fund wants to help European start-ups compete with Silicon Valley and China" . CNBC . Retrieved 2020-04-09 . ↑ "Balderton pioneers fund for buying stakes in European start-ups" . Financial Times . 13 October 2018. Retrieved 10 February 2020 . ↑ "Balderton launches $680M 'early growth' fund to lure startups looking for a different kind of capital" . TechCrunch . 10 June 2021. Retrieved 2021-06-14 . ↑ Martin, Iain. "Balderton Raises $600 Million Early Stage Fund" . Forbes . Retrieved 2021-11-18 . ↑ Fowler, Nina (27 August 2013). "Balderton Capital backs crowdsourced 3D printing network 3D Hubs" . venturevillage.eu . Archived from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ "Aircall Rides Work-From-Home Wave, Now Valued at $500 Million" . Bloomberg.com . 27 May 2020. Retrieved 25 February 2021 . 1 2 Wingfield, Nick (13 November 2014). "Churchill Downs to Buy Big Fish Games for up to $885 Million" . The New York Times . ↑ "Portfolio - Balderton Capital" . Archived from the original on 2014-07-04. Retrieved 2014-09-21 . ↑ "Funnel raises $10m to expand its platform for fully automated marketing reporting" . balderton.com . 19 September 2017. Retrieved 19 September 2022 . ↑ Sun Picks Up MySQL For $1 Billion; Open Source Is A Legitimate Business Model | TechCrunch ↑ Edwards, Cliff (31 January 2014). "Zynga Buys NaturalMotion to Bolster Mobile, Cut Staff" . Bloomberg . Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ "Hybrid real estate agent McMakler welcomes Balderton Capital and GR Capital as new investors" . 23 October 2019. ↑ Grant, Rebecca (17 July 2013). "Vivino uncorks $10.3M to turn anyone into a wine snob" . VentureBeat . Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ Butcher, Mike (28 November 2023). "As pet owners turn to mobile insurance apps, Lassie raises $25M Series B led by Balderton" . Tech Crunch . Retrieved 14 July 2024 . ↑ McDermid, Riley (22 October 2010). "Betfair's IPO soars as investors embrace social gaming" . VentureBeat . Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ Johnson, Bobbie (14 March 2008). "Bebo sale to AOL nets founders a fortune in 3 years" . The Guardian . Retrieved 1 July 2014 . ↑ "Etsy buys secondhand clothing app Depop to tap into gen Z" . the Guardian . 2021-06-02. Retrieved 2021-11-18 . ↑ Hancock, Ciaran. "ScanSafe sale nets Balderton $55m" . The Irish Times . Retrieved 2021-06-12 . ↑ "Shareholders at LoveFilm cash in on bid" . CityAM . 2011-01-20. Retrieved 2021-06-12 . ↑ "Index Ventures, Balderton and Benchmark share in $1bn spoils | Private Equity International" . www.privateequityinternational.com . 4 January 2013. Retrieved 2021-06-12 . ↑ "Insight Partners acquires threat intel company Recorded Future for $780M" . TechCrunch . 30 May 2019. Retrieved 2019-11-24 . ↑ "Microsoft acquires Sunrise calendar" . 4 February 2015. ↑ "OLX Group invests up to $400M in used car marketplace Frontier Car Group at $700M valuation" . 11 November 2019. ↑ Lunden, Ingrid (20 June 2016). "Twitter pays up to $150M for Magic Pony Technology, which uses neural networks to improve images" . TechCrunch . Retrieved 2017-03-03 . ↑ "Twitter is buying Magic Pony technology" . 20 June 2016. This page is based on this
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