Fly Ventures
Berlin-based seed fund focused on B2B software and data-driven companies in Europe.
Fly is the anti-thesis fund that actually walks the walk. "If you are a deeply technical founder or working on a hard technical problem in Europe, your funding options at the inception stage mostly suck," stated Gabriel Matuschka. Founders often find it frustrating to simplify their pitches for investors who apply generic SaaS logic to everything. This approach can be harmful, especially in the early stages of deep tech development. These guys get in earlier than anyone else - Fly often engages with founders 6-9 months before they officially start their companies. The track record speaks for itself: Since Fly invested in Wayve's Seed Round in 2017, the company has raised a total in excess of USD 2B including its latest Series D at a USD 8.6B valuation and In September 2025, Check Point Software Technologies acquired Lakera for USD 300M. The catch? They're genuinely technical gatekeepers - Many early stage funds will say it's all about the team, but we like to think we keep a higher bar than most. If you can't geek out about your tech stack with Fredrik or convince Gabriel why your "impossible" problem is actually solvable, you're not getting in. But if you do make it through, Over 75 per cent of Fly's portfolio companies go on to raise a follow-on round or get acquired vs. the industry average of 31 per cent for Seed VCs in Europe.
- —Best for: Deep tech founders who think 2-3 years ahead of the market
- —Watch out for: High technical bar - they'll stress-test your tech knowledge hard
- —Known for: Finding unicorns before anyone else knows they exist
Fly is a first check VC for technical founders solving hard problems. We invest from day-zero to seed, backing founders from all over Europe. Fly Ventures prides itself on following an anti-thesis investment approach. Their job is to remain highly reactive to the market. Therefore, they find enlightenment through initial meetings with founders and navigate opportunities via visceral curiosity in the problem addressed.
Fly Ventures invests €1 million to €4 million in rounds of €2 million to €10 million at the inception stage. AI has accounted for about 45 per cent of Fly's investments, with vertical applications and industrial tech taking up 35 per cent, and dev tools/infrastructure taking up 20 per cent. They're primarily day-zero to seed investors focused on deep tech and AI-driven startups across Europe.
Gabriel is a founding partner at Fly Ventures and is based in Berlin. Previously he worked with Partech Ventures from 2012 to 2015. Prior to working with Partech, he was co-founder and CEO of TripHunter, which was acquired by brands4friends in 2010. Classic operator-turned-VC with solid exits under his belt.
Fredrik has experience working as a Tech Lead Manager and Staff Software Engineer at Google, showcasing his technical acumen and leadership skills. Fredrik Bergenlid is a Partner & CTO at Fly Ventures. He studied Computer Science at KTH Royal Institute of Technology and also pursued Computer Science and Economics at QUT (Queensland University of Technology). The technical heavy-hitter with serious Google credentials who can actually evaluate deeply technical founders.
Matt Wichrowski, who joined Fly in 2020, explained: "We partner with exceptional technical founders from day zero. Most of these relationships begin through our network, recommending someone from DeepMind or an engineering executive recently returned from the US, who is likely to start a company in the coming year." Very active on LinkedIn with thoughtful deep tech content and seems to be the connector bringing US ecosystem knowledge to European founders.
With Matt Wichrowski, Marie Brayer, Bergenlid, and Matuschka, the firm operates in an equal-GP model of four partners each distributed across Berlin, London, Paris, and Zurich. Then I guess over the last four years or so, Paris, on the more technical side, also really accelerated, which is the reason why we also added Marie, who is based in Pa Paris-based partner brought in to tap into France's growing deep tech ecosystem.
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