Belgian venture capital firm NewSchool VC has
closed its first fund at €10 million to invest in early-stage B2B technology
companies. NewSchool Fund I reached its target after raising €6.1 million at
its first close last September.
The fund is backed by around 50 investors,
including six family offices such as The Millers Office, as well as
entrepreneurs from the Belgian business community, including Willem Delbaere
and Roeland Delrue of Aikido Security, Jean-Louis Van Houwe of Monizze and Luc
Coopman of Cobofisk. NewSchool founder Christophe Morbee has contributed 25 per
cent of the fund himself.
NewSchool focuses on B2B technology companies
at the pre-seed and seed stages. The fund has made 32 investments to date, with
three more in the pipeline. Around 75 per cent of its investments are in
Belgium, with the remainder spread across Germany, the Netherlands, Norway,
Spain, Switzerland, France and the UK.
Morbee founded NewSchool after several years as
an angel investor. He is also CEO of Belgian payroll and HR provider besox,
which has 110 employees and around 4,000 SME clients. NewSchool uses this
network to connect portfolio companies with potential customers.
NewSchool combines capital with support in
areas including go-to-market, sales and storytelling, with a focus on
technology companies looking to automate established industries.
Europe is an engineer’s continent, with
technically strong teams. What’s often missing is someone who takes charge of
go-to-market, sales and storytelling. That’s where we focus, alongside the
capital we provide. There’s still enormous room to automate old industries. We
see plenty of opportunity there for the years ahead,
said Morbee.
NewSchool’s portfolio includes Warren,
Spotable, Cashfeed, Ravical, Donna, Dalton, Feedelity, Alice Law and Exhibitly.
The fund has also recently invested in Swiss company Talentir and Paris-based
Outline.
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