In this episode of the EUVC podcast, Andreas discusses with Fatou Diagne, Founder and Managing Partner at Bootstrap Europe.

Bootstrap Europe is a venture investment firm currently raising the fourth fund, aiming for €350-400M, after closing Fund III with €157M. With €250M in assets under management, Bootstrap Europe is headquartered across London, Luxembourg, and Zurich.

Bootstrap Europe targets companies in the post-Series A+ or Series B stage—those with venture capital already on their cap table, solid KPIs, or valuable patents and assets in place. The firm’s sweet spot? European HQ’d companies, or those with European founders or VCs, with an upcoming allocation to support U.S. expansions. They even have 10% of their fund reserved for other exciting regions, like Africa.

Bootstrap Europe specializes in geeky, transformative sectors: Deeptech, Life Sciences, Cleantech, Fintech, and SaaS, and some of their notable investments are:

• Scandit (Swiss Unicorn) in Machine Vision
• Blueprint Genetics (exited investment, Finnish tech used by Quest Diag during COVID - 1 of 2 largest labs in US)
• Telensa: largest installed base of smart city lighting wordlwide, bought by Signify
• Recent undisclosed exciting investments in robotics, AI healthcare, foodtech, RNA tech

Go to eu.vc for our core learnings and the full video interview 👀

Chapters:

00:03 Meet Fatou Diagne and Bootstrap Europe
00:26 Bootstrap Europe's Investment Focus 
01:25 Diving Deep with Fatou: Trends and Growth
02:51 The Origin of Bootstrap Europe
04:11 Venture Debt vs. Venture Capital
11:11 The Collapse of Silicon Valley Bank
20:27 The Role of Venture Debt in Europe
28:29 Sector Focus: Life Sciences and AI
36:45 Momentum in Business and Financing
37:00 Regional Preferences in Venture Debt
38:16 Germany: Cultural Challenges and Progress 
39:17 Spain: A Unique Venture Debt Market
40:43 Nordics and European Investment Bank
47:33 Macroeconomic Influence on Venture Debt
54:05 Innovative Financing Structures
56:54 Future Predictions for Venture Debt
01:02:09 AI's Impact on Venture Debt and Beyond