Kvanted Ventures, a Helsinki, Finland-based early-stage investment firm, announced its first fund of €70m.
Investors included prominent industrial players, including the established Finnish industrial owner Oras Invest, among others.
Founded by Maria Wasastjerna, Eerik Paasikivi, and Axel Ahlström, Kvanted focuses on early-stage industrial technology startups in Northern Europe. The firm invests in both hardware and software alike, as well as service companies developing new solutions for the industrial value chain, with a focus on industrial automation, sustainability and supply chain resilience.
The fund will invest in around 20 companies, with initial investments ranging from €0.5 to €3m, and a longer-than-average investment term to align with the longer development cycles in the industrial domain.
The first investments from the new fund are Fractory, an Estonian company improving the metalwork production chain, and Resoniks, a Dutch-Finnish company developing AI-powered acoustic analysis for metal companies.
In addition to the core team, seasoned private equity and venture capital investor Heikki Westerlund acts as Kvanted’s chair of the board. Westerlund, former CEO of Nordic private asset management and investment company CapMan, brings to the team a wealth of know-how and experience from the broader investment landscape in the Nordics and beyond.
Kvanted is also joined by a group of Venture Partners with backgrounds in growth companies and large industries alike, including:
- Suvi Haimi, founder of biomaterial company Sulapac and board member at the Finnish Startup Community;
- Lars Peter Lindfors, Head of Innovation at Neste; and
- Kai Öistämö, CEO of Vaisala and board member at Nokia, will actively support and work with Kvanted’s portfolio companies with their knowledge, skills, and broad networks.
Commenting on the launch, Kvanted’s founding partner Maria Wasastjerna said: “The industrial sector is the cornerstone of the European economy. But in terms of technological development and digital transformation, there is still a lot to be done – and a lot of untapped potential. To remain competitive and to contribute to a more sustainable world, the industrial sectors in Finland, the Nordics, and beyond need to evolve. This can be done by accelerating industrial innovation with technology, which in turn requires smart capital and deep industrial expertise – and a connector that can bring traditional industrial players and innovative startups together. There has been no early-stage investor like Kvanted in the Nordic market and we are responding to this demand with an industrial technology fund. Our goal is to quickly grow into the leading early-stage investor in the Nordics for technology companies that are transforming the industrial value chain.”
VCWire
07/11/2023