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Two of Our VC Funds Top Sifted's Rankings for Most Deals in the Last 12 Months

Two of our private equity fund managers, Vitosha Venture Partners and Innovation Capital, find a place in Sifted's rankings. A few days ago, the media platform, backed by the Financial Times, published its list of the ten most active investment funds in Central and Eastern Europe, in which our partners took the top first and second places.
To compile the rankings, Sifted used data from Dealroom, as well as the funds themselves, on the number of new deals completed over the past 12 months. "Two Bulgarian VC funds - Vitosha Venture Partners and Innovation Capital - have closed more deals than any other investor in the region in the last 12 months," the publication sais.
Another Bulgarian fund finds a place in the TOP 10 investors in CEE. This is Sofia Angels Ventures, which ranks tenth among investors from Poland, Lithuania, Estonia and the Czech Republic. Here is the ranking itself:
1/ Vitosha Venture Partners, Sofia
Deals in the last 12 months: 49
2/ Innovation Capital, Sofia
Deals in the last 12 months: 37
3/ Baltic Sandbox Ventures, Vilnius
Transactions in the last 12 months: 21
4/ Metaplanet, Tallinn
Transactions in the last 12 months: 18
5/ SMOK Ventures, Warsaw
Transactions in the last 12 months: 18
6/ Specialist VC, Tallinn
Transactions in the last 12 months: 17
7/ ZAKA VC, Prague
Transactions in the last 12 months: 15
8/ DEPO Ventures, Prague
Transactions in the last 12 months: 14
9/ Presto Ventures, Prague
Transactions in the last 12 months: 13
10/ Sofia Angels Ventures
Transactions in the last 12 months: 13
In Central and Eastern Europe's young startup ecosystem, early-stage investments make up the majority of venture capital transactions, according to Sifted. In 2023, 92% of the 818 deals closed in the region were pre-seed (611) or seed (144) stage. The economic downturn in Europe has left a strong footprint in CEE. While in 2022 start-ups raised €140 million in pre-seed funding and €324 million in seed funding, in 2023 the volume dropped to €99.8 million and €278 million respectively. The data is from Dealroom.
VC funds mostly make local investments in their home markets or in companies in the region, but single deals have also been made in Western European countries as well as in the US.
The media platform publishes news and analysis from Europe's technology and investment circles and features on the new generation of innovators and entrepreneurs taking the continent by storm. This is not the first time Sifted has celebrated the work of our fund managers. Last year, Vitosha Venture Partners found a place in the list of the most active investment funds in Europe for the second quarter of 2023, placing our partners among key investors from the UK, Germany, France and more.