European venture firm Backed VC has closed its third fund, Backed 3, at its $100 million cap, alongside making its 100th investment.
Backed partners with outlier founders building generational frontier technology companies, who have made a fundamental technological or conceptual breakthrough. It leads Pre-seed or Seed stage rounds with investments between $500k and $5 million.
A history of high-performing startups
The announcement follows two high-performing first funds – Backed’s first fund is a top decile fund and returned a further 35 per cent of capital to investors in October 2025.
Now, Backed is scaling its ambition with Backed 3 — a larger fund, increased presence in the US and an expanded global events strategy.
Close to 50 per cent of Backed 3 was committed from 10 leading institutional Fund of Funds, with new investors such as Isomer Capital and Wunderland Capital.
Backed 3 also now counts over 50 family offices and entrepreneurs as investors, including founders from Backed’s existing portfolio.
Backed 3 will focus on three areas of frontier tech, in which Backed has previously seeded unicorns: AI-native therapeutics, blockchain and banking infrastructure and manufacturing automation.
This fund has already reinvested in 6 of its strongest founders from previous funds. The firm partnered early on with the founders of companies such as Invisible Technologies, Thought Machine, General Intuition, and Flow Engineering – all of which have raised $20 to $150 million in follow-on funding rounds in the last quarter from Tier 1 US firms, including Sequoia, General Catalyst, Greycroft, and Khosla.
100 early-stage investments as portfolio yields five unicorns
Backed are now at a landmark 100 Pre-Seed or Seed investments, of which five companies have already achieved unicorn status with valuations above $1 billion, and eighteen have reached an enterprise value of over $100 million.
Backed has a 90 per cent investment follow-on rate from Seed, measured by the companies closing a subsequent funding round, becoming profitable or being acquired.
The intersection of venture capital and events
Since its inception in 2016, Backed has differentiated itself by operating at the intersection of venture capital and events to gather the entrepreneurial community.
Backed runs an extensive VC event programme globally, with 40 events per year, hosting over 4000 founders and investors.
During Slush next week, Backed will host six separate events for 2000 guests.
Andre de Haes, Co-Founder at Backed, said:
“Backed partners with founders striving to build the first trillion-dollar European businesses, in spaces where most do not dare to build.
Over the last decade, we have built a community of humans who have the audacity to take on companies like Nvidia, Google and Goldman Sachs.
Their boldness has led to their success. It has created a flywheel, where our founders are now investing as LPs back into our new fund.”
Alex Brunicki, Co-Founder at Backed, shared:
“We want to support generational European founders building companies that will stand the test of time, who are choosing to build their businesses where they are most primed for success, not for convenience."
For Aerska, Comind, and OchreBio, that is the UK and Europe. But for Flow Engineering, General Intuition and Invisible, that is the US.
And we are developing our firm to support exceptional people wherever they choose to build.’
Lukas Bennemann, Founding Partner at Wunderland Capital, said:
"Backed has built an exceptional reputation among founders and has matured impressively, showing a repeatable edge at the intersection of technical and scientific breakthroughs.
The team genuinely radiates something special — they connect with founders on a deeper level, which truly matters in the highly competitive seed landscape.
You can tell who a ‘Backed Founder’ is, showing clearly the culture and focus of the team. Their relentless drive to achieve the best outcomes continues to make them stand out in the European VC landscape."
Pim de Witte, CEO at General Intuition, shared:
“Alex was truly the first to believe and Backed supported us from the very start of our journey through some very difficult moments.
They are relentless in support of founders and fight when it matters most. It is fair to say, General Intuition might not exist without them. They are world-class, early-stage investors.”
Lead image: Backed VC. Photo: uncredited.
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