Connect Ventures Hits $55M Fund V Close

Connect Ventures has reached a $55M first close for its fifth fund as it shifts further toward technically deep European startups.

What happened

The firm is targeting $80M for Fund V and plans to continue leading pre-seed rounds with initial cheques of roughly $500K to $5M.

Its investment focus increasingly spans AI, infrastructure, hardware, robotics and biotech rather than generic software alone.

Why it matters

European venture funding has become increasingly concentrated at the top end, especially around large AI rounds. That makes fresh pre-seed capital important for the next generation of technical founders.

Connect’s strategy also reflects a wider change in early-stage investing: more funds are searching for technically differentiated businesses that are harder to replicate than standard SaaS.

The bigger picture

As software becomes easier to build, defensibility is shifting toward infrastructure, proprietary data, hardware integration and scientific complexity. European seed funds are adapting by moving earlier into companies where technical risk is higher but competitive moats can also be deeper.