Segunda ronda de investimentos da SeedCapital
A SeedCapital, empresa de investimento na área de Tecnologia, Media e Telecomunicações, completou em Janeiro a segunda ronda de investimentos, no seguimento do processo de selecção realizado no segundo semestre de 2010.
Os investimentos foram feitos em duas startups portuguesas: a GoBundlr e a FashnPolis.
A GoBundlr está a desenvolver um produto para gestão de conteúdos digitais, na área de “content curation” que está actualmente a ter uma relevância significativa.
A FashnPolis está a desenvolver uma rede social para fans de moda com um modelo de negócio inovador.
No primeiro semestre de 2011 a SeedCapital irá proceder a uma nova ronda de investimento através da selecção de projectos ao workshop Kickstart, realizado pela Maverick.
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Para mais informações:
Mário Valente, Maverick/SeedCapital
mvalente@maverick.pt
mvalente@seedcapital.pt
Friday 13th 2010 Milestones
Although our current focus is on investing in the projects that we selected out of our last Kickstart 2H10 event (two out of the 5 that were present, plus another one in Lithuania), these last couple of weeks, and yesterday in particular, were quite significant to our current investments since a few meaningful milestones were achieved. So here they are:
- Sysactum, had their first paying customer for their veterinary clinic management SaaS offer Actumvet.
- Tarpipe, who provides a webbased tool for the management of social media workflows, processed over 100.000 workflow events during July and is well on track to achieve the 1 million processed events mark by September. Yesterday, Friday 13th, was also a milestone for Tarpipe, since RTP (Portuguese state owned TV channel) has become a customer and has started to use tarpipe to feed their news items to several social networks. They join Jornal Oje (business newspaper) as users of Tarpipe.
- Quirkafleeg, a games company focused on creating ZX Spectrum remakes, finished yesterday (Friday 13th) the recordings of the vocal parts for the Deus Ex Machina 2 game soundtrack. We’re extremely proud to say that the final session was the recording of Sir Christopher Lee‘s voice as the narrator/storyteller/programmer (you might know him as Dracula, Scaramanga, Count Dooku or Saruman, among several others).
For the record, he’s the one with the beanie. The other mustachioed gentleman is Mel Croucher, the game’s author. Two legends in one picture and in one game.
O presidente do IAPMEI disse há dias que os business angels são fundamentais para as start-ups, defendendo o apoio à atividade deles. Contudo, em Portugal são ainda praticamente inexistentes as empresas de deteção de negócios emergentes e algumas iniciativas da banca neste domínio não passam de aproveitamentos da designação, uma vez que arriscam somente em negócios já firmados e lucrativos.
Sendo que os tempos de crise oferecem as melhores oportunidades para o investimento, como explicar que haja tão pouca atividade de seed capital e venture capital a amparar o empreendedorismo português?
(pergunta de Paulo Querido para o Uma Pergunta Por Dia)
A SeedCapital, empresa de investimento recentemente criada, investiu no primeiro semestre deste ano em três startups portuguesas que actuam na área das novas tecnologias.
“A melhor altura para investir é em altura de crise. É nesses momentos que existem mais oportunidades e menos concorrência. A SeedCapital foi criada com o objectivo de investir nos projectos das pessoas que têm a coragem de se auto-desempregar.”, refere Mário Valente, fundador da empresa de gestão de investimentos Maverick e da empresa de investimento SeedCapital.
Criada por um grupo de business angels portugueses, a SeedCapital vem resolver dois problemas dos empreendedores portugueses: a falta de capital semente que apoie projectos embrionários e a falta de conhecimentos na condução e gestão desses projectos.
A SeedCapital investe nas indústrias de Tecnologia, Media e Telecomunicações, principalmente em projectos de âmbito tecnológico baseados na web.
Os três primeiros investimentos foram feitos em três empresas portuguesas: a Tarpipe, a Sysactum e a Quirkafleeg.
A Tarpipe desenvolveu um sistema e um serviço que ajuda as pessoas e as empresas a garantir a sua presença nas múltiplas redes sociais e a monitorizar nessas mesmas redes as referências ao seu nome, à sua empresa ou à sua marca.
A Sysactum desenvolveu uma aplicação para clínicas veterinárias que permite a gestão das mesmas de forma simples e em formato web, permitindo o acesso à aplicação a partir de qualquer ponto onde haja um computador ou um telemóvel.
A Quirkafleeg licenciou a propriedade intelectual do jogo Deus Ex Machina, uma referência nos jogos do ZX Spectrum, e pretende criar uma nova versão dirigida às consolas PS3 e XBox.
De acordo com Mário Valente, estes foram apenas os três primeiros investimentos. “A SeedCapital pretende investir em 2 ou 3 empresas por semestre durante os próximos 3 anos, totalizando um investimento de cerca de 1 milhão de euros em cerca de 20 empresas. Já no inicio de Julho realiza-se o próximo workshop Kickstart, onde serão selecionados os próximos investimentos”.
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Para mais informações:
Mário Valente, Maverick/SeedCapital
mvalente@maverick.pt
mvalente@seedcapital.pt
Lisbon, by the Sea
Note: this article was written for a Techcrunch guest post back in August but was never published. Maybe we’re not news worth printing…
Who wouldn’t like to get their startup going in a city by the sea, with great climate, surrounded by hills, and get around the city on trams or get to the beach through a beautiful suspended bridge? And you can also add to that great food and great wine…
No, I am not talking about San Francisco, California. I’m talking about Lisboa, Portugal. Although we do have a beach called California close by: the Californian coast was first explored by a Portuguese sailor at the service of the Spanish crown, who was a native of Sesimbra, a fishing town 30 km south of Lisbon where there is a place called California Beach.
It must be said that Lisbon probably isn’t on the radar as a preferred location for startups; or that it is a hotbed of entrepreneurial action. But it could be; it can be; it should be. We are, after all, the West Coast of Europe. The business environment has been getting friendlier after years of slowing bureaucracy and there are some local startups that should warrant a closer look.
As for the business environment: you can now incorporate in Portugal for €360 in less than one hour and, in some cases, you can even do it online; corporate tax rate is an average 25% but a capital gain on the sale of shares held for more than one year is tax exempt; foreign direct investment has a lot of tax incentives and so does investment in high tech companies; 100Mbps fiber-to-the-home connections are available since January and 1Gbps connections will be available in September.
Regarding the startup environment there are a lot of changes going on. A lot of talent is available since there are three major universities in and around Lisbon where stuff like transparent and paper transistors is being invented. Some students now prefer to get their own startup going, instead of working for some major company; some are even leaving those companies and their secured jobs to go it alone.
Some local startups that deserve special mention:
- Adegga.com a social network for wine lovers
- Tarpipe a tool to automate content workflow, publication and sharing
- GoPlan an online project management and collaboration tool
- GuestCentric a booking engine and a reservation platform for small hotels
- Survs a tool for the creation of online surveys
- PostCrossing a worldwide postcard exchange
- MyTVShows an online service for managing your TV show watched/to-watch lists
- Maverick a small YC-clone seed investor (disclosure: I am one of the founders)
Recently Microsoft has acquired a Portuguese company (Mobicomp) specialized in mobile phone software for an undisclosed amount. If Microsoft is in on it, maybe others should take notice of other Portuguese projects.
I believe that Lisbon should be the preferred location for startups that are intent on going worldwide. If you are an American company, we are the closest European country; we can be the perfect point of entry in Europe. If you are an European company, we are the EU country which is closest to the US. In both cases this would save you a lot of time on flights :-). Aditionally we have close bonds with Brazil, one of the BRIC emerging markets that also speaks Portuguese (one the most spoken languages worldwide) and close bonds with nearby Spain (its connection with other South American countries is also a potential advantage). If you add to that nearby Africa, you can understand that our geographic position was an advantage for Portuguese seafaring explorers (the first venture backed startups) who discovered new worlds and created globalization. Maybe these characteristics could also be an advantage for startups.
According to Paul Graham’s wisdom, Lisbon is all about style, hipness and quality of life. The message that Lisbon sends out is the same as Berkeley’s or San Francisco’s: you should live better.
I’d say that the next best thing to the West Coast of the US would be the West Coast of the EU. Maybe we should be on your startup’s radar after all…
