The Reverse Pitch: Oxx

We tend to focus on the ‘plumbing’ - where technology plays a role in optimising existing processes and data flows but doesn’t necessarily add a magical ‘black box’ interpretation of the data. We’re really excited about the fact that today the cost of launching a SaaS business is very low because you have all the infrastructure and integration libraries immediately available, so you can focus on your core value-add and all the integration is sorted for you. --Oxx

Oxx was founded by Richard Anton and Mikael Johnsson in 2017. The fund is one of the few in Europe to specialize solely in SaaS. Last month, the firm announced the close of their debut fund of $133 million to invest in startups in Europe and Israel at Series A and beyond. Oxx is headquartered in London, United Kingdom and Stockholm, Sweden.

Can you summarize your investment thesis in three sentences: Oxx backs ambitious European B2B Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) companies, propelling them from promise to success by providing growth capital and support. We invest in proven teams with successful products and strong growth, who have the potential to break out and become category-defining companies. These companies are ready to scale on the international stage and we work hard to get them there, leveraging our sector-specific knowledge, networks and capital, creating a strong partnership and mentoring the management team.

What industries and business models are you most interested in investing in? While we invest across infrastructure and application software, we’re currently excited about five key themes in particular: data convergence and refinery, the future of work, financial services infrastructure, user empowerment and sustainable business. We only invest in Software-as-a-Service companies with a high element of recurring revenue. The sales and go-to-market efforts in these companies are more predictable and directly scalable, and the quality of revenue in the B2B space tends to be higher. We leverage our years of experience scaling SaaS companies, supporting companies to become global players and to stand out in their space as market leaders.

Which technologies do you find most exciting right now, and why? We tend to focus on the ‘plumbing’ - where technology plays a role in optimising existing processes and data flows but doesn’t necessarily add a magical ‘black box’ interpretation of the data. We’re really excited about the fact that today the cost of launching a SaaS business is very low because you have all the infrastructure and integration libraries immediately available, so you can focus on your core value-add and all the integration is sorted for you. For example, Funnel is a data integration play that aggregates, normalises and harmonizes data across a large number of sources, thereby fixing a huge problem for businesses and finally making it manageable to effectively analyse marketing performance.

How much do you typically invest? We recently closed a fund, having raised $133m, and typically invest $5 - 20m. We prefer to start at the lower end, so we have the ability to follow up in future rounds. We also almost always sit on the boards of companies we team in, so we can work together closely to support the company to great success.

Beyond funding, where does Oxx VC provide the most “value-add” for founders? Focusing so strictly on the SaaS space means we have strong relevant networks and can provide access to clients, strategic partners and future acquirers. It also means we bring extensive expertise to the board and can really support the management team because we understand what they do and have decades of applicable experience. We take an active role and create strong partnerships with management teams, supporting them from the day-to-day challenges to the long term strategic view, all the while being aware of what pitfalls to avoid.

Do you have any geographic restrictions on investments?  We invest in Europe, with particular focus in the UK, the Nordics and Israel.

What’s one investment from your Anti Portfolio that you wish you hadn’t passed up: We’ve seen some fantastic companies that we didn’t manage to work with. We love what Mentimeter, Attest, Egress and Gameffective are doing, for example.

If you could invest in any type of business or technology right now (real or imagined) what would that be? We’d love to see any business led by a phenomenally capable entrepreneurial team, who is equally deeply knowledgeable about one of the many areas of unsatisfied need. For example there’s exciting AI technology out there that can complete complicated processes really fast. But many of the AI companies we’re seeing, despite having strong AI teams, are really focusing on services and consulting, trying to find applications that are suitably complicated enough that it’s worth using AI for. The technology is there but the business models aren’t, yet. Another area we like is fintech, where disruptive technology is replacing expensive and cumbersome systems used by large banks and other legacy financial service providers. Other areas that offer exciting opportunities include edge computing, hybrid cloud infrastructure and dev ops. We don’t pre-judge what the great opportunity is and we love to let the entrepreneur prove it to us.

What is the best way for founders to get in touch? All of the above! You can find us at most SaaS events, look out for our office hours, get in touch through our network or just drop us an email: [email protected]