Working from the colourful startup ecosystems of Prague and London, ZAKA VC has introduced the institution of its first fund, sized at €15 million, aimed toward supporting early-stage startups throughout the US and EU markets. Based in 2020 by seasoned entrepreneurs Jan Kasper and Peter Zalesak, ZAKA VC started as a household workplace investing purely personal cash into pre-seed and seed startups. The agency has since grown into a strong group of six core members, with greater than 55 invested corporations in its portfolio and over €11 million invested.
A number of the notable investments by ZAKA VC embrace ExcepGen, Wise Biotechnologies, Miros.ai, Supliful, Lime Therapeutics, and Webel. Initially, ZAKA VC centered totally on the home Central and Japanese European (CEE) market however has since expanded its presence to the UK and US. Not like most CEE-based funds, ZAKA VC is devoted to exploring and funding the European diaspora within the US, US-based groups, and CEE-based groups with ambitions to scale to the US.
In response to demand from exterior traders to co-invest alongside ZAKA, the agency has launched its first enterprise capital fund. ZAKA VC Fund I, sized at €15 million, commenced with a €10.5 million first closing in June 2024, with a minimal restricted companion (LP) ticket of €130,000.
A legacy of entrepreneurship
The origins of ZAKA VC traced again to the household companies of founders Jan Kasper and Peter Zalesak. These seasoned entrepreneurs have constructed and co-own over 60 corporations with a mixed turnover exceeding €1.4 billion throughout numerous sectors, together with retail, media, mobility, vitality, improvement, agro, leisure, and hospitality. ZAKA VC was based as a synergistic addition, increasing its actions into the enterprise capital asset class to be nearer to the forefront of innovation within the quickly evolving financial system.
Jan Kasper shared his motivation for creating ZAKA VC: “The set off to create ZAKA was my daughter Valentina, who launched me to the rising startup ecosystem. I acknowledged this chance as an thrilling approach to make investments the capital we generated in our household companies. I recommended this concept to my pal and fellow entrepreneur Peter, who has all the time been a tech and innovation fanatic.”
Peter Zalesak added: “Even earlier than founding ZAKA, I invested and helped startups, however I spotted that it was a full-time enterprise. After conversations with Jan, we determined to do it professionally – to rent the fitting group and set up guidelines and processes for choosing, evaluating, approving, and managing the very best corporations which are rising round us.”
Funding focus and technique
Andrej Petrus, Head of the Funding Committee at ZAKA VC, stated: “Two attention-grabbing elements led us to conclude to double down on early-stage investing within the coming years and to enlarge our capital base. Firstly, there’s a robust imbalance between demand and provide of early-stage funding worldwide, in comparison with the height in 2021. Capital is scarce, however the variety of new first-time or repeating founders is rising. The second and extra thrilling issue is a brand new expertise paradigm. Developments in AI are opening new, beforehand non-viable enterprise circumstances throughout all sectors. Analogous to the cellular and cloud period, we imagine that the present years will create new, category-defining future decacorns within the AI house.”
The enterprise capital fund goals to put money into pre-seed and seed-stage startups throughout Europe (predominantly Central Europe, Baltics, UK, DACH) and the US, performing as a co-investor with the flexibility to co-lead. The primary funding focus is on B2B software program, and cross-sectional purposes of AI in B2B, biotech, and well being tech.
Jan Kasper, Co-Founder and Managing Accomplice of ZAKA, said: “The US ecosystem stays in our curiosity, and we plan to reinforce our presence there. It produces extremely competent and motivated founders and presents an enormous market to beat. Because of this the funding returns are extraordinarily compelling, regardless of increased valuations in comparison with the CEE area.”
