Tera Ventures brings its fund size to €43M with several global investors stepping in as limited partners
EstVCA member Tera Ventures announced bringing its fund size to €43M with several global investors stepping in as limited partners.
Tera is an early-stage venture capital firm with more than 10 years of experience in propelling Nordic and Baltic founders to the global stage. It has invested in several prominent European startups, including the UK-based neobank Monese, business management software Scoro, proptech platform Rendin, and IP-licensing management platform Brainbase. Previous successes include GrabCAD (acquired by Stratasys) and Vitalfields (acquired by Monsanto).
Tera stands out for its supportive culture where founders benefit from a co-founder-like mindset from their investors at the seed stage. It also has a proven playbook to propel companies on to a global market and a network of top syndicate partners and strategic LPs that can facilitate commercial collaboration in new markets, specifically to the US and Japan.
Limited partners in the fund now include European Investment Fund, under the EstFund, LHV Pension Funds (Estonia), ITOCHU Corporation, Mistletoe Venture Partners International (Japan), Perot Jain, MasterBorn, Inc., Jonas E. Neihardt (USA), as well as other investors from the Nordics and Estonia. Stepping in as advisors are Pär Nuder, long term advisor to NorthZone and EQT, who also joins as an investor and Barbara Piette of Knightsbridge Advisers.
Andrus Oks, Founding Partner at Tera Ventures: “We’re happy to further reinforce our global reach and have new strategic investors on board that add value beyond money. Both Itochu in Japan and Perot Jain in the US are corporations that may invest directly and in later stages as well and give our portfolio companies numerous options for commercial collaboration and provide unique inroads to new markets. They are also interested in collaborating with select deal-flow companies so we have processes in place to facilitate such relationships as well.”
Stanislav Ivanov, Founding Partner at Tera Ventures: “The obvious benefit to founders is that we have more capital to deploy. But additionally, now more than ever, we are able to connect entrepreneurs with top international investors and help them engage in commercial collaboration with the strategic ones. We’re also gearing towards extending these opportunities to deal-flow companies.”
Yusuke Sugihara, Head of LP Investment Strategies, ICT Division at ITOCHU Corporation: “We really admire the Nordic model of nurturing born-global startups. This is why we’re excited to partner with Tera Ventures as they have had an up-close view of the region’s success stories. Our network of businesses spans many industries and geographies across Asia and beyond, so we hope to introduce new and exciting opportunities for European companies.”
Anurag Jain, General Partner at Perot Jain: “It is amazing to see how quickly Estonia has grown into a significant start-up hub that rivals much bigger countries. We chose to partner with Tera Ventures to gain access to the technologies coming out of the region, with the goal of being a strategic partner for the start-ups to help them grow in Europe, the United States and globally. Our unique operating company platform provides a number of collaboration opportunities, particularly in the mobility/logistics, proptech and healthcare industries, allowing Perot Jain to extend support to the Tera portfolio companies beyond our capital.”
Photo credit: Jaanus Jagomägi/Unplash; Tera Ventures