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SEE News: Romania's SeedBlink snaps up Dutch Symbid, eyes expansion in France, Czechia
Romanian technology investment platform SeedBlink said on Tuesday that it acquired Netherlands-based investment crowdfunding platform Symbid in a push to significantly broaden its investor pool and consolidate its European footprint.
The transaction will add to SeedBlink's high-net-worth network, taking the combined total of individual investors to 62,000 and the two platforms' aggregate investments to over 110 million euro ($111.7 million) in 250 start-ups to date, the buyer said in a press release. The financial details of the deal were not disclosed.
Through this acquisition, the Romanian fintech will also gain additional connections to Symbid's partner banks, venture capital funds and angel investors.
"Both companies have made a name for themselves in providing private investors with access to curated European start-up opportunities, so this is a natural move looking for the European consolidation game," Ionut Patrahau, SeedBlink co-founder and corporate development manager, said. He added that the combination of the two businesses will lean on complementary advantages from eastern and western models to bolster portfolio diversification and investment infrastructure.
SeedBlink, which continues to be on the lookout for further investment opportunities across Europe, has an eye on France and the Czech Republic as potential areas for expansion, a company spokesperson told SeeNews.
Set up in 2011, Rotterdam-based Symbid has fostered a 50,000-strong investor community. In the decade to end-2021, the Dutch company backed more than 180 start-ups, over a third of which in technology, through equity and convertible loan deals worth 35 million euro.
The merger will give rise to a proprietary digital finance infrastructure and a secondary investment market, in which individuals and professional investors across Europe will be able to interact, according to Symbid founder Robin Slakhorst.
Looking ahead, Symbid will lead the combined company's investment activity in the Benelux region, in which it has been traditionally strong and which SeedBlink also prioritises in its expansion plans.
Launched in early 2020, SeedBlink has helped raise over 75 million euro in start-up investments, attracting over 12,000 individual investors from 60 countries. It backs European tech companies in pre-seed to Series B funding stages, and has a portfolio of 62 start-ups, among which Hungarian fintech FlowX, Bulgarian cargo drone developer Dronamics, Serbian marketing automation start-up Hunch and Romanian AI-powered virtual business assistants provider Druid. Elsewhere in Southeast Europe (SEE), SeedBlink has offices in Bulgaria and Greece.
In June, the Romanian fintech launched a secondary market for investors.
PublishedAugust 16, 2022
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Tudor Goicea
Co-founder of Aqurate
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As a startup founder, I am happy to witness SeedBlink’s dedication to expanding their support for early-stage companies beyond funding, towards a healthy equity management via Nimity. A solution to help better navigate relations with stakeholders, employees and future investors is needed in Europe. Less admin work and bringing transparency to the cap table are immediate benefits I was able to test.
Delia Iliasa
Managing Partner
SanoPass
SeedBlink is a transparent solution that connects entrepreneurs with great business plans, with investors, at different stages in their development. It is a great tool for us, a democratization of access to funding, I would say.
Ioan Iacob
Founder
FLOWX.AI
We really loved the SeedBlink journey. We reached our fundraising goal within hours of launching. About 100 investors joined our vision and invested almost $2 million in FLOWX.AI through the Private Deal Room. At the same time, working with SeedBlink to prepare for the funding round was an excellent exercise for our entire team, and we received and felt the support from the SeedBlink team members who took on an advisory role.
Dan Vidrașcu
CEO
VOXA
SeedBlink made the (investment) process run smoothly. We appreciate all the support SeedBlink's professional team has provided.
Tinu Bosinceanu
Founder and CEO
Upgrade Education
It's important to look for and choose a platform that you resonate with, that shares your mission with, a platform & its people with which you feel you can have good working relationships. we got an excellent relationship going forward; we talked a lot and we were in touch on a lot of matters and I think this was important. Having people who believe in your idea is of great help.
Kimmo Rytkönen
Founder and CEO
Income
Running the financing round was like any other fundraising; we had to be active in our community as well as in SeedBlink's investor community. After the launch, everything happened very quickly, and SeedBlink organized several pitch events for investors, which we found very useful for the round momentum.
Svilen Rangelov
Founder and CEO
Dronamics
We immediately clicked with the SeedBlink team as their fundraising expertise was immediately obvious and their no-nonsense approach really appealed to us. After all, fundraising is only a means to an end, and we liked how the SeedBlink team was really focusing on supporting us and on getting things done.
Mihai Darzan
Founder
Procesio
Our main expectation has been to raise the amount we were aiming for, and both rounds launched on Seedblink exceeded our targets, so we’re very happy with that! Even though the launched funding campaigns have been purely crowdfunding rounds, we are thrilled to actually receive extra support from some of the investors, who have chosen to get involved and help us generate product awareness, whenever they can.
Catalin Mester
Founder
Voxa
I am recommending SeedBlink without hesitation, to every founder that raises capital, especially early-stage tech startups. SeedBlink is a crowd investment platform that will also provide their startup with visibility, for Angels and VCs.
Dragoș Iliescu
Founder and CEO
Brio
In the early stages, we have been funded by several early (angel) investors, and one and a half year ago through an equity crowdfunding campaign on SeedBlink. Of course, this impacted our growth in many positive ways, partly due to the cash influx that, evidently, was sorely needed, but in a larger part due to the fact that our responsibility towards our shareholders has become more stringent and explicit, becoming embodied in our market approach.
Costin Tudor
Co-founder and CEO
Undelucram
Given the accelerated growth we observed at the end of last year and the beginning of 2021, we want a new capitalization, quickly. This is a bridge round that we will use for one year, and the advantages that SeedBlink offers are the speed at which we were able to list for financing and the experience that we gain as a result of this public listing, similar to a listing on the stock exchange.
Diwaker Singh
Co-Founder & CEO
Crikle
As a platform that only serves technology ventures, SeedBlink can connect the start-up with more than just money. SeedBlink investors are primarily technocrats who understand the objectives of the fundraising company and are also able to post-funding contribute with business opportunities. The minimum investment threshold, and technology focus, differentiates SeedBlink from other fundraising platforms. A perfect fit for a technology start-up seeking intelligent funding.
Florin Stoian
Co-Founder & CEO
Milluu
SeedBlink boosted our brand exposure and facilitated the financial support we were seeking. Having a campaign on the platform allowed us not only to meet a team of professionals - that guided and helped us prepare the necessary materials - but also opened doors for increasing our brand awareness and have discussions with VCs & angel investors we have never reached before. This campaign gave us the encouragement we needed to push the product further, while the record-breaking fundraising (only 2 hours from the launch of the campaign!) was a great confirmation that our product is needed in this market and that we should continue innovating.
Raluca Jianu
CEO & Co-founder
Epic Visits
SeedBlink has created a vital ecosystem for startups at the beginning of their journey by equipping entrepreneurs with expertise, encouraging honest and sometimes uncomfortable but necessary discussions about risks and vulnerabilities through a suite of tools, and facilitating connections with investors who share the founders' vision and can contribute to their success. I have greatly appreciated the constant support of Eric and the entire team at all stages of the campaign. Thank you so much!
SeedBlink S.A. is registered in the Register of the Romanian Financial Supervisory Authority (ASF), under number PJR28FSFPR/400001, as of 03.11.2022 with an EU passport as per European Securities and Market Authority (ESMA) register of crowdfunding services providers.
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