The past few years have been a bumpy ride for the venture capital industry. A global pandemic threatened disaster, yet rapidly shifted into an unprecedented market rally for technology and innovation–only to be followed by a period of resurgent inflation and rising interest rates, and a challenging market downturn.

Having fought our way through these boom and bust years, 2024 was a time for us at Beringea to return to controlling the fundamentals. In fact, this was the theme of our portfolio company retreat in 2024–an opportunity for us to bring together CEOs and founders throughout our portfolio to reflect, to collaborate, and to consider the future.

Throughout the conversations fostered at the retreat–and more broadly across our work at Beringea in 2024–it is clear that we made significant progress in 2024. We backed remarkable companies, we said goodbye to some successful investments, and we worked with our portfolio to grasp opportunities for growth.

Nonetheless, building start-ups is never easy–which means that controlling the fundamentals is always critical to success: understanding strengths, identifying weaknesses, and building businesses that adjust to these characteristics.

In our own work, a focus on controlling the fundamentals ensured that it was a busy year for investing–in total we completed 22 investments across our UK and U.S. funds–as well as exits, portfolio events, and milestones for the firm. This article captures a few of those highlights.

New investments: Welcomed to the portfolio in 2024

2024 saw several additions to our UK and U.S. portfolios–and we even welcomed two of our most successful former founders back into the portfolio!

• Andersen EV: we renewed our partnership with David Martell–former founder of Chargemaster, a highly successful investment for our UK funds that David sold to BP in 2018– and led a £4m Series A for Andersen EV, a provider of premium home charging points for electric vehicles.
• Farmer J: our UK funds led a £5.5m investment in Farmer J, a rapidly growing chain of quick-serve restaurants that serve responsibly-sourced, healthy, delicious tasting meals. Anyone who has seen the queues outside any of Farmer J’s 13 sites across London will understand how popular this brand is!
• Iceberg Data Lab: Beringea UK led a £10m Series A for Iceberg Data Lab, a provider of climate and biodiversity data for financial institutions. Building on our substantial experience of backing sustainability pioneers–from Chargemaster to Gorilla and Social Value Portal–this one was a great fit.
• MOTH: our UK funds led a £4.6m investment in MOTH, the UK’s leading ready-to-drink cocktail brand. MOTH’s premium canned cocktails are now available in more than 3,000 UK supermarkets, and it is now making inroads in the US, which we’re excited to support through our transatlantic approach to scaling companies.
• Sovato: Beringea U.S. made an initial investment in Sovato, a healthcare technology company enabling remote surgery and procedures. Sovato was co-founded by Yulun Wang, who also founded former Beringea U.S. portfolio company InTouch Health. That company was sold in 2020 to Teladoc in a $600 million acquisition.

Follow-on rounds: Doubling down on our investments

Across our UK and U.S. funds, we provide patient capital that supports entrepreneurs throughout the growth of their business. When we see opportunities to scale faster, we are therefore able to strengthen our position and provide further funding.

In 2024, the successful growth of several portfolio companies provided us with opportunities to double down on our investments:

• AccessPay: a member of our UK portfolio since 2019, AccessPay is a fintech platform that enables corporates to manage payments more efficiently. Following a successful period of growth, including expansion in the US, AccessPay closed a $24m strategic funding round led by True Ventures, the Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm, alongside Beringea and other existing and new investors.
• Gorilla: first backed by our UK funds in 2022, Gorilla is an energytech business that enables energy retailers to process vast amounts of critical and complex data–since our initial investment, the business has rapidly established itself as an industry standard essential to the energy transition. Headline, a US-based venture capital firm, led Gorilla’s £20m Series B, with additional backing from our UK funds and other existing investors.
  

Exits: Portfolio companies entering new chapters

We said goodbye to several portfolio companies who realised opportunities to enter a new chapter in their growth, including:

• Lupa Foods: one of the longest-standing investments of our UK funds, Lupa Foods is a food import and distribution business that has gone from strength to strength in recent years, reaching more than £45m in revenues–Beringea UK sold its stake in the company as part of an acquisition by Geia Food, the leading food concept provider in the Nordics. Our UK funds delivered a 5.2x cash-on-cash return over the course of the investment.

Portfolio events: Highlights from our retreat and the Beringea Scale-Up Academy

‘Controlling the fundamentals’ was the theme of our biennial portfolio retreat, which returned in September 2024. Bringing together 50 members of our portfolio, our team, and our closest advisors at Soho Farmhouse in the UK, the retreat was an opportunity to unwind, connect, and reflect.

Through a series of workshops, breakout sessions, and activities across 48 hours, we encouraged CEOs and founders to reflect on their strengths, identify potential challenges for their businesses, and consider how they might work with their leadership teams to address these issues in the future.

More than anything, connecting with each other outside of the formal agenda proved to be the greatest success of this year’s event. We are hugely grateful to our sponsors GPS Capital Markets, Zendesk, and ZRG Partners for helping us to make this possible.

Alongside the retreat, we continued our busy programme of events for the Beringea Scale-Up Academy, which brings together the leadership teams of our portfolio companies to consider how to drive growth in their roles, teams, and organisations. Scale-Up Academy sessions hosted in 2024 included:

• AI in CX: Beringea hosted a session on how AI can uncover insights to guide product development, identify at-risk customers, and enhance satisfaction. Proactive AI-driven engagement helps businesses resolve potential issues early, building stronger relationships and long-term loyalty.
• The role of the CEO in sales: a roundtable discussion explored how CEOs can effectively scale their sales teams, including strategies for hiring the right people, leveraging KPIs, and using storytelling to drive success.
• Cyber security: this session provided start-ups with an overview of cyber security risks, risk-reduction strategies, and guidance on legal and regulatory considerations. Attendees gained practical insights into identifying and responding to potential incidents.

Portfolio highlights: Award wins, partnerships, and landmark moments

Beyond funding, it continued to be a busy year of progress for our portfolio, with many celebrating landmark achievements. These included:

• Beringea UK portfolio companies named to Sifted 250: three Beringea portfolio companies - Learnerbly, Plum Guide, and Gorilla - were named to the ‘Sifted 250’, a ranking of Europe’s 250 fastest-growing startups based on revenue growth over the past three years.
• Beringea U.S. portfolio companies honored at MVCA 17th annual Michigan Venture Capital Association awards event:
  • Deepak Ravindra, CEO of Micro-LAM, was nominated for Entrepreneur of the Year
  • Mike Klein, CEO of Genomenon, won Entrepreneur of the Year
  • Optilogic won Up-and-Coming Company of the Year
• Authenticx sets a new standard in healthcare listening at scale: The team at Indianapolis-based Authenticx launched a groundbreaking suite of AI models that will revolutionize healthcare contact centers by detecting reportable events with unmatched accuracy.
• Social Value Portal wins TECH4GOOD recognition: Social Value Portal was honoured with the TECH4GOOD award at GP Bullhound’s ‘Investor Allstars 2024’. This recognition celebrates the company’s innovative approach to creating meaningful social impact alongside commercial success.
• ATLAS Space Operations, Inc. capitalized for growth: the Northern Michigan-based provider of ground station services for satellite communications announced a $15 million pre-Series C funding round in September, supplying the working capital needed to triple revenue over the next 12 months.
• DASH and MOTH celebrated as leading brands: our portfolio companies excelled at ‘The Grocer Gold Awards 2024’. DASH Water, the healthy seltzer made with wonky fruit, was crowned Soft Drink Brand of the Year 2024. MOTH was recognised as the Drinks Brand of the Year for its outstanding performance.
• My 1st Years expands into new markets: My 1st Years launched 'Made Yours,' a brand offering personalised gifts for all occasions, extending their expertise beyond children's products to celebrations for all ages.
• Optilogic partnership with GM: The world’s largest automotive company, General Motors Co., entered into a partnership with Beringea U.S. portfolio company Optilogic to solve complex global supply chain decisions with real-time results monitoring
• “World’s friendliest dentist” brand expands to a new state: Dentologie, a Beringea U.S. portfolio company that provides dental services in neighborhood practices, opened its first practice outside of its initial Chicago market, in Seattle.
• Genomenon Acquires the Jackson Laboratory's Clinical Knowledgebase: The purchase established a first-of-its kind view of the genome encompassing both germline and somatic variants with inclusion of the Clinical Knowledgebase of cancer insights.

Beringea milestones: Team developments, anniversaries, and fundraising

It was also an active year for the firm. We celebrated the promotion of several members of our UK investment team. Emma Biasiolo and Luke Edis were promoted to Investment Directors, while Piotr Bukanski and Jodie Miller advanced to Investment Managers. We also welcomed a new member to the team, Kiu Kim, as an Investment Director.

We also reflected on the 30th anniversary of the launch of the Venture Capital Trust scheme in the UK. As one of the UK’s largest and longest-standing managers of VCTs, we have played a key role in the growth of an industry that now manages more than £6.5bn in funds backing the growth and success of UK entrepreneurs. Read this piece from Stuart Veale for more detail on this important milestone.

We closed the year having launched the latest fundraise for our UK funds, the ProVen VCTs. Earlier in the year, the funds had successfully closed more than £25m to continue backing scaling companies throughout the UK. We look forward to connecting with the ambitious entrepreneurs building the next generation of success stories to put this funding to work.

For information, please visit www.beringea.com. If you would like to know more about our U.S. investment activities, please email info@beringea.com and contact us at info@beringea.co.uk for our U.K. investment team.

In the United States of America, Beringea operates as an SEC-registered investment advisor, Beringea, LLC. This communication is intended solely to provide information regarding Beringea’s potential financing capabilities for prospective portfolio companies and does not constitute an offer of investment management or investment advisory services by Beringea or any of its affiliates.