Spring has SPRUNG for UK Tech

Things are looking up for UK Tech.

Strong financial results from the likes of Deliveroo , Cleo & Zuto . ￡37m raised by Curve . Another secondary sale for Moneybox . All this and more...

Before we dig in I wanted to get some feedback on another newsletter I'm thinking about starting - UK VC Roundup. It would be a similar format to this but would focus on all things UK VC related; funding rounds, M&A, broader tech news, a weekly Meet The VC, a round up of some very early exciting startups, and a roundup of the best articles/podcasts in the last week.

If interested let me know here. I'll start writing it if it's clear this is something people want so please let me know!

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BUILDING IN PUBLIC UPDATE

It's now been 5 months since I launched Quick Pitch, the newsletter where founders pitch their startup to my community of VCs, Angels and Operators. Key updates:

• Grown to over 1900 subscribers (+17% in the last two weeks).
• Started monetising through sponsorships. Our first sponsorship was a great success so if you want to get your business in front of >700 founders drop me a message.
• This means monthly revenue has gone from ￡0 to over ￡1k which is nice.

Want your startup to get featured? Fill out the form here.

Interested in seeing two top startups a week? Sign up here: https://quick-pitch.beehiiv.com/

THE NEWS

Project Europe

Harry Stebbings announced that he has teamed up with 125+ top European entrepreneurs to launch Project Europe - a €10m fund to invest in the next generation of European founders.

The fund will invest €200k in 18-25 year olds who will also receive mentorship from the community of leading entrepreneurs. In exchange, the fund, which is being backed by 20VC, Adjacent, Point Nine as well as the entrepreneurs in the community, will receive a 6.6% stake in the business.

There was a lot said about this initiative, a lot was positive but unfortunately there was also a lot of criticism for its apparent lack of diversity, for being focused on under 25s only, and for being a fairly small amount of capital.

Personally I'm a huge fan - the more capital flowing into the hands of young, ambitious European builders the better.

Revolut

The UK's leading fintech has been in the news again due to a number of big announcements:

• It's on a hiring spree for its banking team as it expects to be a fully licensed bank in the UK by July.
• It's expanding into South Africa.
• It's launching an Employer Of Record product, taking it even further into the realm of HR tech.

Moneybox & Crowdcube

It was announced this week that Moneybox is doing another Secondary Sale directly through Crowdcube .

At the end of 2024 two institutional investors acquired ￡70m of Moneybox shares through a secondary transaction. This pushed Moneybox's valuation to ￡550m and came off the back of stellar financial results:

• ￡77.2m of Annual Revenue (vs ￡28m in 2023)
• ￡26.5m of Profit before Tax (vs -￡4.1m in 2023)

This new transaction extends that round and gives Moneybox’s retail investors the same opportunity on the same terms enabling Moneybox’s 26,000+ Crowdcube investors to sell their shares, while giving the entire Crowdcube community the chance to buy in.

Curve

UK Fintech Curve raised ￡37m from Hanaco Ventures.

Curve, the app that combines payment cards into a single interface, has now amassed 6 million users and raised over ￡200m.

This raise was at an undisclosed valuation, with its last public valuation being ￡600m when it raised a ￡9m raise on Crowdcube.

This latest round was rumoured to be at a large discount to this.

Klarna

Klarna officially filed for IPO and released 2024 financial results.

It will list in New York under the ticker signal KLAR. Here are the headlines from its 2024 results:

• $2.8bn of revenue (+24% YoY)
• $21m of profit (vs $244m of losses)

That’s a huge turnaround but still relatively low profit. It hasn't confirmed the target price but it was rumoured to be $15bn.

How this IPO fairs could have huge repercussions for when (and where) UK fintechs list.

OakNorth

OakNorth has acquired CUB Bank to accelerate its US expansion.

CUB Bank is an FDIC-insured bank launched in 2022 and based in Oakland County, Michigan.

OakNorth is one of the few UK fintechs to successfully launch into the US. It began operating across the pond in mid-2023 and by the end of 2024, had lent $685m to businesses there, so an acquisition to increase growth makes sense.

CUB Bank has established relationships with hundreds of SMEs in Michigan which OakNorth can now tap in to.

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FINANCIAL RESULTS

Deliveroo

Deliveroo announced its 2024 financial results:

• ￡2.1bn of revenue (+2% YoY)
• ￡2.9m of profit (vs ￡32m loss in 2023)

￡3m of profit may not seem like a lot but it’s a HUGE turnaround from the ￡32m of losses recorded in 2023, and its massive ￡295m of losses in 2022.

Analysts were expecting better however, which sent share price falling by 7%.

Cleo

One of the UK's most exciting fintechs released its 2024 mission report which included some great numbers:

• $185m of Annual Recurring Revenue (vs $93m in 2023)
• 1m Monthly Active Users

It also grew its team by over 40% in 2024, meaning there are now 300+ employees globally.

In my view Cleo is fast becoming one of the best startups to come out of the UK in the last 10 years. There is no way it doesn't become a unicorn in the next year or so.

Zuto

Zuto, the car-financing Fintech founded by James Wilkinson and Ryan Dignan announced its latest financial results:

• ￡62m of turnover (+26% YoY)
• ￡7.2m of EBITDA for FY24 (vs ￡6.8m in FY23)

Great results!

THAT'S IT

Thanks all - until next time.

Seb