Amy Lewin

Punchy interview with LocalGlobe's Saul Klein on the meh-ness of unicorns, the importance of ARR and the need for UK institutional investors to get serious about tech (see below)

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@amyrlewin.bsky.social @sifted.eu

The Next Web conference shuts down The Amsterdam tech conference won’t be back in 2026 — and the TNW media business will also be winding down this month

Scoop: Long-running tech event TNW is shutting down, along with the media arm of its business

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Baillie Gifford writes up investment in Bending Spoons by 89%, as company raises further funding for acquisitions Baillie Gifford has written up its stake in Italian app developer Bending Spoons, as the startup raises further funding for acquisitions

New: Baillie Gifford writes up investment in Bending Spoons by 89%, as the Italian app developer and acquirer raises further funding for acquisitions

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Meet the UK and Ireland’s fastest-growing startups in 2025! 🇬🇧

We're back with our second annual Sifted 100: UK & Ireland Leaderboard, in partnership with Marriott Harrison — a ranking of the 100 fastest-growing startups by revenue growth.

See the rising stars: sifted.eu/intelligence...

Founders: be more selfish Running yourself into the ground by doing everything will hurt you — and your startup — in the long-term, so founders: be more selfish

Founders: why you've got to be more selfish

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Octopus Energy turns profit for second year running as its tech arm surges London-based energy supplier Octopus Energy recorded its second year of profit. company’s tech arm, Kraken, saw significant growth in 2024.

New: Octopus Energy has recorded its second year of profitability, despite a dip in revenues. Its tech arm, Kraken (which files separate accounts) saw profits increase 480%.

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A16z ramps up scout presence in Europe, despite closing London crypto office US VC giant Andreessen Horowitz has been ramping up its scout network in Europe over recent months, despite closing its London office

A16z has ramped up its scout presence in Europe, despite closing its London crypto office last week.

I tracked down at least a dozen scouts in Europe — and found out what their 'deal' is: sifted.eu/articles/a16...

Starling shake-up: CEO poaches former OVO Energy teammate to oversee neobank's operations It’s the second c-suite hire new CEO Raman Bhatia has made this month.

PEOPLE MOVE: Starling Bank has appointed former OVO Energy Joe Gordon chief operating officer as its new COO

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Customer support’s hot: How AI is changing who’s most valuable in tech Will customer support leapfrog from tech's most undervalued department to most valued department this year? Tessa Clarke thinks so

"In every business I’ve worked or consulted for, the customer support team has always been located in a literal — or metaphysical — basement. Undervalued and overlooked."

In the AI era, is that about to change?

Olio founder Tessa Clarke thinks so:

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Inside the bitter courtroom drama between Getir founders and lead investor Mubadala: ‘It’s a coup’ A Dutch court found on Friday that Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala had acted in the interests of speedy grocery giant Getir.

“Knowing what I know now, I would have never taken Mubadala as an investor,” speedy grocery upstart Getir's founder Nazim Salur tells Sifted. 🍿

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DeepSeek gives Europe's AI startups a reality check The company spooked the markets with the release of a high-performing, low-cost chatbot.

New: European tech VCs and founders are wrestling with what the surprise success of China's AI startup DeepSeek means for startups on the continent... More on @sifted.eu sifted.eu/articles/dee...

Nearly 80% of tech companies are considering a secondary share sale in the next year Equity management platform Ledgy surveyed 2,550 respondents in Europe, the UK and the US — and found that tech companies are keen on secondaries

Nearly 80% of tech companies are considering a secondary share sale in the next year.

The findings follow a spate of fintech secondaries last year — with Revolut, Monzo and Tide all letting employees sell shares.

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Internal documents reveal how the UK spent years luring Andreessen Horowitz to London: 'Most crypto firms have left' Internal documents reveal the UK government spent years luring VC giant Andreessen Horowitz to London before it ditched the city for Trump.

Exclusive: Internal documents reveal how the UK government spent *five* years luring Andreessen Horowitz to London.

Now, just over a year after opening their office, they're gone.

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Andreessen Horowitz closes UK office, pivots back to US crypto market The US VC firm previously told Sifted that it was ‘all-in on the UK’.

In news that may surprise nobody, Andreessen Horowitz is closing its UK office and pivoting back to the US crypto market

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Founder dresses as burglar to troll corporate rival: ‘I’m ready to embarrass myself’ Inspired by viral YouTuber MrBeast, founder Giuseppe Baidoo took the streets to stand up for his snack startup Gusto.

A true Friday story from @freyapratty.bsky.social

Founder dresses as burglar to troll corporate rival: ‘I’m ready to embarrass myself’

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Ledger founder David Balland was kidnapped this week in France — and has now been released

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Startups are acting like PE buyout firms – here’s why European startups are increasingly buying up care homes, vet practices and dentists, then using their software to run them

Startups are increasingly acting like PE buyout firms – here’s why

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‘We need a DOGE for Europe!’ Elon Musk’s White House takeover inspires – and divides – Europe’s tech leaders The Tesla mogul's White House takeover has stirred division among Europe’s tech elites, prompting some to pick a side.

Elon Musk’s rise to the role of “chief buddy” under Donald Trump’s second White House administration has stirred division among European tech leaders, with some calling for the EU to adopt his deregulatory agenda.

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Founder salaries jumped up across Europe last year, with the median salary doubling for bootstrapped founders, according to a new report from VC firm Creandum.

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Does Europe need to be more like the US? In 2024, the squabbling on LinkedIn about which place was better to start a business seemed to be taken up a notch.

Does Europe need to be more like the US to build global champions? The debate has intensified at a time where Europe's economic progress has stagnated and countries are battling to dominate the next wave of critical technology. More in the Sifted Daily: sifted.eu/articles/eur...

'We're fully financed' says Northvolt's sister company Stegra Northvolt’s collapse leaves Stegra as Europe’s largest and best funded climate tech company, with €6.5bn raised to date.

Northvolt's bankruptcy leaves its sister project Stegra (formerly H2 Green Steel) as Europe's flagship green infra project.

I chatted to Stegra about whether Northvolt's fate has scared off the banks, Stegra's expansion plans and its hopes to mop up Northvolt talent:

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The tech events Sifted will be attending in 2025 Europe has plenty of tech and startup events — here are the 20+ events that the Sifted editorial team is (currently) planning to attend in 2025.

The tech events we'll be heading to in 2025 😎

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Checkout.com saw losses balloon 73% to $306m in 2023 Checkout.com, one of Europe’s most valuable startups, saw losses at its UK entities balloon 73% to $306m in 2023, its financial filings show.

New: Checkout.com saw losses balloon 73% to $306m at its UK entities in 2023, filings show.

Revenues from processing payments dropped after severing ties with “a large merchant”, thought to be crypto exchange Binance.

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Sifted’s most-read stories of 2024 AI, acquisitions and founder fallouts all made the cut among the stories that caught Sifted readers' attention in 2024.

Sifted's most-read stories of 2024 👇

Feat. a whole lot of AI, and sprinkling of drama

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The things nobody told me about launching a fund: The ops and costs of running a first fund Cocoa's Carmen Alfonso Rico shares everything she's learnt about the operational costs of running a first-time VC fund.

How much does it cost to actually run a VC fund?

Carmen Alfonso Rico from Cocoa breaks it down for @sifted.eu 👇

This is *such* a useful piece:

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Ageing, static and skint: Nine charts that explain what's going on with London transport How the ability to travel around the city shapes the capital, its residents, and the lives we lead.

This from @jim.londoncentric.media is a superb piece of reporting and data crunching on which is going on demographically and socially in London, through TFL charts. Jim's substack, Londoncentric, is very much worth your time.

www.londoncentric.media/p/london-tra...

Inside Gloucester Circus: the family office which managed to catfish London’s VC ecosystem Although the VCs, family offices and even the lawyer that often accompanied Ian Slater were real, his promises of money were often not.

Ian Slater set up a family office, Gloucester Circus, to invest into VCs. There was just one problem: the VCs and family offices around Slater were real, but his promises of money were often not.

This is the story of the man who managed to catfish the VC ecosystem.

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Nuclear fusion could provide us with clean, cheap and abundant energy within our lifetimes.

But... there are *a lot* of technical challenges to overcome first, as Francesco Sciortino, founder of nuclear fusion startup Proxima Fusion, explains on the latest Sifted pod.

bit.ly/49C055t

Why we’ve removed job titles at ElevenLabs We want our team to be asking 'where do I have the highest impact right now?' rather than 'how do I become head of X'?

Last week GenAI startup ElevenLabs got rid of job titles.

Here's why:

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Oxford Nanopore files lawsuit against Chinese biotech giant UK biotech unicorn Oxford Nanopore has filed a lawsuit against Chinese biotech BGI over the misuse of confidential information.

New: UK biotech Oxford Nanopore has filed its promised lawsuit against China's BGI over the misuse of confidential information.
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