VentureFriends is a European early-stage venture capital firm with offices in London, Athens, Barcelona, and Warsaw.
Portfolio
7
companies
AUM
£70.0M
under management
Simpler
Simpler provides a unified checkout platform for merchants.
Carmoola
Carmoola simplifies vehicle purchasing through a direct-to-consumer car finance platform.
Plum Fintech
Plum Fintech provides a smart money application that automates personal finance and investing.
Proportunity
Proportunity offers equity loans to help home buyers bridge affordability gaps.
Plum
Plum provides a smart money application that helps users automate savings and investments.
Tymit
Tymit provides a mobile instalment credit card designed to give customers control over their repayments.
Stasher
Stasher provides a sharing economy network for short term luggage storage.
George Dimopoulos
Founder
George co-founded VentureFriends after working as an angel investor, associate at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, and credit officer at the National Bank of Greece.
LinkedInApostolos Apostolakis
Founding Partner
VentureFriends, MMC Ventures, Lamda Development, and VGC backed the seed round, with the lead investor remaining undisclosed.
"Our mission has always been to eliminate the complexities of managing multiple systems and provide merchants with a single, unified checkout solution,"
The investment was backed by QED Investors, VentureFriends, InMotion Ventures, AlleyCorp, and u.ventures to accelerate market expansion.
"We are incredibly excited about this new investment. It’s a testament to the hard work of our team and the clear value we bring to car buyers by doing things differently."
The Series A round was led by QED Investors with participation from VentureFriends and InMotion Ventures.
"Used-car finance couldn’t be more ready for a fintech revolution. Consumers want the freedom to go shopping anywhere, knowing what they can spend, without sending off reams of forms and payslips."
The smart money app secured the initial funding target within eight hours from over 3700 participants.
"I want to thank our 3700 investors for joining Plum in its journey with this new round of crowdfunding. I am thrilled to see that our campaign has secured such good traction in a short amount of time and I am excited for what is yet to come."
The seed round was led by InMotion Ventures with participation from VentureFriends, BCI, Clocktower Ventures, and angel investors to fund product development.
"Like many people, I went into it without a clear idea of how much I should spend or could afford."
The financing round was led by VentureFriends and Kibo Ventures to help expand the team and increase maximum loan sizes.
"We’ve been investing in proptech startups that improve the real estate journey since 2016. In Proportunity we saw a product that can positively impact the lives of thousands of FHBs. Proportunity founders, Vadim and Stefan, have experienced the pain of trying to get on the housing ladder themselves and we were impressed with their resilience, drive and progress so far. Proportunity directly addresses the pain of FHBs, it makes housing more affordable and more attainable while also sharing the house price risk, instead of putting the risk solely on the FHB and/or their family."
The financing round was led by dmg ventures and Ventura Capital to support international growth and asset expansion.
"Wealth for all is our mission and we’ve made some great strides towards making that reality this year, expanding our user base massively and delivering a product that looks more-and-more like a financial super app. But there’s a lot more work to be done. The appetite for smart and intuitive investment products is enormous, particularly in other parts of Europe where often old-fashioned banks are the only option for growing your money. With the help of this new investment and our upcoming crowdfund, our app will become the natural choice for anyone in Europe looking to improve their finances for the long-term."
VentureFriends backs Tymit with fresh funding following a doubling of the fintech's user base.
"We’re calling time on the traditional credit card,"
The round was led by Global Brain and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development to fuel product development and international growth.
"Plum is becoming the one single app for all your financial needs"
The luggage storage network has raised £1.9m from VentureFriends and angel backers to grow its presence in the US and Australia.
