Polish VC market: 2021 summary — record growth!
Recap of the Polish VC market based on the research Inovo Venture Partners has done with PFR Ventures.
The Polish venture capital market is growing as we speak. In 2021 we jointly invested EUR 793M (PLN 3.6B) in Polish startups (69% came from private sources). The value of transactions was 40% higher than in 2020, and if we include the estimated size of the DocPlanner round, the increase was as high as 70% YOY. We also saw a 35.5% increase in the number of rounds (424 in 2021 vs 313 in 2020).
This jump was driven mainly by the data from Q4’21. Many top Polish technology companies announced new rounds, including Ramp and three startups from the Inovo portfolio: Packhelp, Spacelift and Infermedica (the latter raised in December, but announced in January).
Top 10 rounds in Q4 2021
Top 10 rounds in 2021 overall
More happening at later stages
2021 was marked by an increase in the number of later-stage rounds. We saw 73% more transactions at a Series A level than in 2020. Throughout most of the year (Q2-Q4) it was an average of 15 each quarter. In October-December every fifth transaction was at series A or later.
This serves as proof of the growing maturity of the ecosystem. Top founders have no problems whatsoever in raising subsequent rounds to finance the rapid development of their companies. Provided these numbers stabilize, in 2022 we can expect up to 60 Series A rounds (although I keep my fingers crossed for raising the bar to a 100).
At the same time, we see a lot of activity at an early stage as well — 80–100 pre-seed / seed rounds quarterly. Overall, we recorded 32% more early rounds than in 2020 (367 vs 278).
Round size ↑
The average round size rose by 25% YOY — from EUR 1.5M (PLN 6.8M) in 2020 to EUR 1.9M (PLN 8.5M) in 2021. However, if we exclude megarounds the growth rate is even more astonishing reaching 80% YOY — from EUR 0.9M (PLN 4M) in 2020 to EUR 1.6M (PLN 7.1M) in 2021. Numbers are driven mostly by the top rounds mentioned above.
The average seed was at EUR 0.6M (PLN 2.9M) and the average Series A was at EUR 4.7M (PLN 22M).
Money knows no borders
Polish VCs are increasingly interested in companies outside of Poland. The number of foreign investments doubled — 29 rounds in 2020 vs 63 rounds in 2021, which was more than I anticipated last quarter. The overall value of rounds is 3.6x higher than it was before — EUR 22M (PLN 101M) in 2020 vs EUR 80M (PLN 366M) in 2021.
Top global VCs are also paying more attention to what’s happening in Poland. 58% of rounds in terms of value were co-financed by foreign VCs. To name just a few examples — Balderton Capital led Ramp’s round and Insight Partners was the lead investor in Spacelift’s round, in which we participated as well.
This is the path we’ll follow
Last year has perfectly shown which direction the Polish ecosystem will be heading in the years to come. Growing share of the private capital, increasing number of later-stage rounds, and the growing appetite from Polish entrepreneurs who are not afraid to fight (and win) in the global markets. The most wonderful aspect of this is that Poland is just warming up. Stay tuned!
Methodology: how did we collect data
We conducted this research in collaboration with PFR Ventures. We sourced our information from aggregators such as Crunchbase, MamStartup, Pitchbook, and Dealroom.
What qualifies the transaction as “Polish”?
1. At least 1 of the co-founders is from Poland.
2. There is a Polish office with full-time employees on the ground.
3. The company is funded by a Polish VC.
4. The company recognizes Poland in its materials (website, press releases).
Inovo Venture Partners is a first-choice VC for ambitious founders from Poland and the CEE region. We back early-stage, post-traction startups with up to €3M of initial investment, and help them build global brands while driving growth of the local startup ecosystem. We take great pride in being close to top founders who think big. We’re investors in: Booksy, Restaumatic, Sotrender, Infermedica, Spacelift, Tidio, AI Clearing, Zowie, Jutro Medical, Intiaro, Packhelp, Preply, Eyerim, Allset, SunRoof, Archbee and AhoyConnect. Our second fund reached a total of €54M.
For more information visit: inovo.vc
