Golden Egg Check has announced that their venture capital fund has raised 5 million euros from investors. With this fund, GEC Capital I, Golden Egg Check aims to make a total of about 35 investments in tech companies over three years.
Launched in 2022, the fund now has a portfolio of 22 startups, mostly Dutch software companies. This makes GEC Capital one of the most active private venture capital funds in the Netherlands. With the new capital injection from several (former) tech entrepreneurs, the oversubscribed fund has reached the final close on the hard cap of 5 million euros.
Active investor
Distinctive to the investment strategy is the co-investment model, in which investments are always made together with a specialized venture capitalist or with a group of relevant angel investors.
Thomas Mensink, partner at GEC Capital, explains how this works: “We have now co-invested with, for example, Speedinvest (Austria), Norrsken (Sweden) and Curiosity VC (Netherlands). We hitch a ride on their knowledge and expertise. At the same time, we bring in our network of investors so that our portfolio companies get faster and better access to (follow-on) capital. In this way we can do many deals with a small team and ensure an optimal spread for our investors.”
Thomas Mensink, partner GEC Capital. Photo credits: Haitsma & Prins
A community of entrepreneurs
Ytsen van der Meer, venture partner at GEC Capital, adds: “In addition, we are building a founder community, because we see that entrepreneurs learn an awful lot from each other. That peer-to-peer interaction is valuable and comes into its own in an active fund in which many deals take place.”
That there are many entrepreneurs among the new investors is no coincidence, according to Van der Meer: “These investors have backgrounds in fintech, cyber security, e-commerce, AI, online marketplaces and HR tech, among others. We use their expertise in assessing the quality of the startup and they are willing to help our portfolio companies move forward. We consider them part of our community.”
Daring to invest early
Companies GEC Capital has invested in include Runnr.ai (AI chatbot for hotels), Sirius (sustainability co-pilot for metals and mining companies), Haaven (platform for design and construction of wooden homes) and QDI Systems (quantum dot technology for medical imaging).
Gilles Meijer, founder of Golden Egg Check and partner at GEC Capital, explains, “We generally invest at an early stage, in Pre-Seed and Seed, but in terms of sector we are broadly interested because we always co-invest with a specialist. With our 5 million euros, we can make 30 to 35 investments and still keep enough behind to continue investing in the most successful companies.”
The investment period of Golden Egg Check’s first fund runs until the summer of 2025. Meijer: “We will make sure that our second fund is ready immediately after that. We will flesh out that plan in the coming period. The next fund will be slightly larger but because we see that our co-investment strategy is working, we will continue to focus on that.”
Golden Egg Check team met vlnr Ytsen van der Meer, Thomas Mensink, Anna Dyachenko, Gilles Meijer en Iryna Pranovich. Niet op de foto: Erwin Starke
For more info, please contact Thomas Mensink via capital@goldeneggcheck.com.
