How Danske Bank didn't pull out as an LP from byFounders.

ByFounders, a venture investment firm based in Copenhagen, Denmark, was announced by the Danish media that it had remained without its main LP (limited partner), Danske Bank, in the investment fund, which presumably would have had a DKK 500M commitment.

The news is factually wrong, according to the company, contacted by Nordic 9.

ByFounders has never had any agreement with Danske Bank. Not even one of a DKK 500M.

Upon launching, in September 2017, ByFounders announced that it aims to raise DKK 750M, looking for making investments in about 40 companies from the Nordic area. 

The first part of it, DKK 250M, was closed in 12 months, while the company claims to keep its target to raise additional capital to the fund in 2018. Normally raising a new venture fund takes between 18 and 24 month.

The money was raised from a range of contributors, including 30 local angel investors such as Claus Moseholm, Peter Mühlmann, Jacob Jønck, Tommy Ahlers and Danny Lange.

Eric Lagier, managing partner at ByFounders:

"We are excited that we have managed to raise our first close of a  quarter million DKK of the fund in record time. This allows us to start investing in the next generation of Nordic founders with global ambitions.

The investors behind the fund includes Vækstfonden (“The Danish Growth Fund”), a string of Danish family offices, successful entrepreneurs and the fund’s management team.

We have already identified a group of very promising startups, who we plan to invest in and actively help become global successes, similar to Zendesk, Unity, Sitecore, Vivino and many other Nordic tech companies. Founders of these companies have all invested in byFounders and are now ready to help the next generation of founders.

In the last 6 months we have been in dialog with a set of institutional investors. As we have a good collaboration with Danske Bank, we would have liked to have their participation in our first close. However timingwise this was not possible. We are still in close conversation with Danske Bank and we hope to include them before we close our fundraising during 2018.

As part of establishing the fund, we have been in dialogue with a number of family offices and successful entrepreneurs, many of which already are Danske Bank customers. It has therefore been a given for Danske Bank and byFounders to work together to present byFounders as an investment opportunity for this group of investors."