Sifted

🎉 We are so back! The 2025 B2B SaaS Rising 100 ranking has officially launched. 🎉 Sponsored by Sapphire Ventures, this ranking and report shine a spotlight on the B2B SaaS companies that are just a few steps away from joining the ranks of $1bn-plus unicorns. Every year the ranking evolves as a ripple effect of the market forces shaping the Rising 100. This year’s key takeaways include the debut of a new AI-native category (dominating the top 10), Stockholm's rise to one of the top three startup hubs and a levelling AI playing field — not just between countries but companies too. Congratulations to the Top 10 startups on the ranking: #1 Lovable #2 Tessl #3 FlexAI #4 n8n #5 Black Forest Labs #6 Legora #7 Tacto #8 Photoroom #9 Port.io #10 Vertice Explore the SaaS startups building the software backbone of the future 👉 https://lnkd.in/e_9V3eCZ For a deeper dive on the ranking download the report here 👉 https://lnkd.in/ehdsrmXM Co-sponsored by Lazard. #B2BSaaS #Rising100

NEW: I wrote about the substackification of VC — a trend where investors are starting to create more and more of their own content, often long-form and often on Substack. It’s changing how deal flow happens, how information spreads and who gets access to the industry’s inner workings. With the help of some great interviews with Maiken Paaske, Francesco Ricciuti, Dr. Andre Retterath and Rubén Domínguez Ibar, I tried to figure out whether it's a good or bad thing. Link is in the comments 👇

🥁 New podcast! Once upon a time, Mistral AI was Europe’s buzziest tech company — raising a huge €105m seed round in 2023 to build GenAI models and compete with the likes of OpenAI. But as the sector's matured, and we’ve seen application-focused AI startups like app maker Lovable and defence tech Helsing rise to the top of the hype pile, how is the Paris-based startup living up to its early promise? This week, French tech reporter Daphné Leprince-Ringuet, who's been following Mistral like a hawk since it launched (and she joined Sifted!) two years ago, joins me on the podcast to debate just that. Listen here: https://lnkd.in/eYJZSPrm

Sifted's Anne Sraders recently polled VCs from NGP Capital, Expansion Ventures, OTB Ventures and Alpine Space Ventures for the non-portfolio, spacetech startups they've got their eyes on. Among them: 🇩🇪 constellr — which launches microsatellites equipped with cryo‑cooled thermal‑infrared sensors to map Earth’s surface temperature with 30 metre resolution. 🇭🇷 SeaCras — which is using satellite imagery and AI to monitor coastal water quality in real time. 🇱🇺 OQ Technology — which develops tech to turn every low-orbit nanosatellite into a roaming cell tower. 🇩🇪 Hypersonica — which is designing a reusable vehicle that can sprint past Mach 5 [five times the speed of sound], drop a microsatellite (or a defence payload) into orbit and glide home for another flight. Christian Noske | Sandra Budimir | Adam Niewinski | Joram Voelklein

You're scaling fast but is fraud scaling faster? 🔍 Every fast-growing startup faces the same tension: how to welcome new users quickly – while keeping trust high, costs low and risk under control. Join our upcoming virtual Sifted Talks on July 23 at 12:00 BST, Frictionless and fraud-free: Is it possible to scale without compromise? Fintech reporter Tom Matsuda will be joined on the panel by: 🎙️ Nida Sattar, Product Director at Allica Bank 🎙️ Shaun Puckrin, Chief Product Officer for GoCardless 🎙️ Adrian Jenkins, General Manager, EMEA at SEON 🎙️ Dmitrii Vasin, Head of Compliance Products for ANNA Money Register here: https://lnkd.in/e-V2RPGW

Eurazeo has closed €650m of a new billion-euro growth fund, two years after four managing directors left the firm at once, delaying fundraising efforts by over a year. The new fund will back scaleups across Europe with tickets ranging from €20-100m, with a focus on AI applications for enterprises: https://lnkd.in/dgWEWkhN

Sifted's look back at H1 in European tech is now live! 💰 Equity investment totalled €23.8bn from 2,143 funding rounds — an 11.5% year-on-year decrease but a 21% rebound on H2 2024. Venture debt financing reached €7.1bn — a steep fall from the €21.4bn lent last year, but similarly, 63% up on H2. 💶 The median seed and Series A round size is up 5.3% and 2.1% respectively, but at Series B and C, there’s been a 25.3% and 13.6% fall compared to H1 2024. 🇪🇸 Spain drastically increased its H1 funding by 132% YoY: both Barcelona and Madrid have seen 100%+ growth; as well as Munich, which was only €348m behind Paris. However, it's Berlin (17.4%) and Amsterdam (16.7%) that were home to the highest proportion of AI-native funding rounds compared to the total deal count in their cities. 🧫 Healthtech attracted the highest investment (€5.7bn) — a 10.3% increase over last year. Deeptech came in a close second, with €5.2bn. Climate tech funding has fallen 40%. 🥷 AI agents is Europe’s fastest-growing sector, with deal count climbing 226% YoY — raising €1.7bn in total, the second-highest of any sector behind drug discovery (€2.2bn). 🤝 Sifted tracked 433 M&A deals, which holds steady with H1 2024's 420. The highest concentration of activity is in B2B SaaS (189 — up 17% YoY), consumer (59) and fintech (56).

BREAKING: Lovable reaches $1.8bn valuation with $200m Series A raise --- Swedish vibe coding startup Lovable has raised a $200m Series A led by Accel as it looks to build out its engineering team and accelerate growth globally. One of Europe’s hottest AI startups, Lovable is developing AI agents to enable users to create apps and websites without needing to learn how to code. It’s part of a wave of startups using AI models from labs such as OpenAI, Anthropic and Google offering a vibe coding platform. The round, which values the company at $1.8bn and gives Europe its ninth unicorn of 2025, also featured participation from existing investors including 20VC, ByFounders, Creandum, Hummingbird and Visionaries Club. It comes just six months after the startup’s $15m pre-Series A funding round in February. A number of founders were also involved, including ElevenLabs’s Mati Staniszewski, Klarna’s Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Synthesia's Victor Riparbelli and Steffen Tjerrild and Revolut’s Nik Storonsky through his QuantumLight fund. Just two years on from being founded, Lovable has fast become one of the most hyped startups in European tech. https://lnkd.in/e-fw7J2J

Q&A with SoftBank partner Sumer Juneja 🎙️ He talks investing in Europe versus India, hype cycles and the future of AI agents. Sifted sat down for a live Q&A with Juneja, an investment partner at Japanese tech giant SoftBank, where he’s spent most of the past seven years overseeing the firm’s investments across India and Europe. Explore the full Q&A👇 https://lnkd.in/efFxXu4p

It's time to celebrate! 🎉 Congratulations to our senior reporters, Miriam Partington and Freya Pratty, who’ve won B2B Story of the Year at the Headlinemoney Awards 2025 for their investigation into Gloucester Circus. The judges praised the piece for its depth of research, strong collaboration, and sharp storytelling in a sector that rarely welcomes scrutiny. Their words: “Investigating these complex stories takes time and multiple skills, and the value of getting this right is clear in this great story… the rigour of the research had to be spot on.” A fantastic recognition of their hard work — and a proud moment for Sifted and quality B2B journalism. You can read the full announcement here 👇https://lnkd.in/e7XGXZXM