Connect Ventures Raises $55M First Close of Fund V

TL;DR

Connect Ventures, the London-based pre-seed and seed firm founded in 2012, has raised $55 million in a first close of its fifth fund, Fund V, against an $80 million total target — its fifth vehicle backing technical founders across Europe with $500k-$5m checks. Sifted independently confirmed the first-close status, reporting that Connect "raised $55m in a first close of its fifth fund, with a target of $80m." The fund is anchored by the British Business Bank, with returning LPs Aldea Ventures, Sella Venture Partners, and Molten Ventures, alongside new European family offices and several founders of Connect-backed companies. It matters because Connect is sharpening its focus toward AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech with a deliberately small, GP-only investment team, at a moment when many seed funds are scaling up headcount and check volume rather than narrowing.

Key Takeaways

An $80 million target is flat against Connect's last two funds, not a step-up. Connect Ventures' Fund III closed at $80 million in 2020 and Fund IV closed at $80 million again in September 2023, per Crunchbase News and TechCrunch's own reporting at the time. Fund V's $80 million target keeps the firm at the same fund size for a third consecutive vintage, a deliberate discipline choice rather than the size creep common among seed funds riding two AI-driven fundraising cycles.

The GP-only, no-associate structure is the actual product being sold to LPs. Managing Partners Pietro Bezza and Sitar Teli, alongside General Partner Rory Stirling, run the entire investment process themselves with no junior investment staff, which the firm frames explicitly as the mechanism for "high conviction and high support" — a structural bet that founder access to decision-makers matters more than deal-flow volume.

The sector pivot toward AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech marks a real shift from Connect's product-led SaaS roots. Connect built its reputation over three funds backing product-led, often B2B software founders (Typeform, TrueLayer among Bezza's board seats). Fund V's explicit focus on "technology fundamental to the product" — AI infra, robotics, hardware, biotech — signals the firm is repositioning around technical depth and deep tech rather than product-and-distribution advantages alone.

British Business Bank anchoring, plus founder-LPs, gives Connect a self-reinforcing capital base. Having exited or growing founders from its own portfolio come back as LPs in Fund V is a strong endorsement signal that's hard to manufacture, and pairing that with a state-backed anchor investor gives the fund a stable core before the more opportunistic family-office capital layers on top.

Fund Overview

Fund Name: Connect Fund V
Fund Size: $55 million raised in a first close, against an $80 million target — confirmed as a first close (not a final close) by Sifted's independent reporting
Stage: Pre-seed and inception-to-seed
Check Size: $500,000 to $5 million
Geography: Europe
Focus: AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech — companies where technical depth is fundamental to the product and the problem being solved
Key LPs: British Business Bank (anchor); returning LPs Aldea Ventures, Sella Venture Partners, and Molten Ventures; a group of European family offices; and several founders of Connect-backed companies

Why This Fund Matters

Connect Ventures has been investing at pre-seed and seed in Europe since 2012, and its last two funds — Fund III in 2020 and Fund IV in September 2023 — both closed at $80 million, according to contemporaneous TechCrunch and Crunchbase News reporting. Holding Fund V at the same $80 million target is a notable discipline signal in a market where seed-stage fund sizes have generally crept upward as more capital has chased AI-era opportunities; Connect is explicitly choosing depth of support per founder over expanding assets under management.

The firm's own framing for Fund V leans hard into a specific founder archetype: technical builders with "earned," not "learned," insight into hard problems, who are deep enough to see what the market can't yet and technical enough to build it themselves. That's a narrower filter than most seed funds apply, and it tracks with Connect's stated shift toward AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech — categories where founder technical depth is arguably a stronger predictor of outcomes than go-to-market instinct alone, which was closer to Connect's original product-led SaaS thesis across its first three funds.

The GP-only structure — Pietro Bezza, Sitar Teli, and Rory Stirling doing all the investing themselves, with no associates or principals in between — is unusual to maintain across five fund cycles and thirteen-plus years. Most seed firms that reach Fund IV or V territory add junior investment staff to handle increased deal volume as fund size grows; Connect appears to be using flat fund size specifically to avoid that pressure, keeping partner-to-founder ratios tight even as the firm's brand and inbound deal flow presumably compound over time.

LP composition also tells a story about the firm's positioning. British Business Bank as anchor investor signals continued UK government confidence in Connect as a conduit for early-stage capital, while the presence of Aldea Ventures and Sella Venture Partners as returning LPs (both are themselves European fund investors with venture-specific mandates) suggests Connect has built durable institutional relationships rather than needing to rebuild its LP base from scratch each cycle. Founders of Connect-backed companies returning as LPs in Fund V is arguably the strongest signal of all — it means people who watched the firm operate from inside a cap table chose to back it with their own capital afterward.

The Team

Sitar Teli is Managing Partner and a founder of Connect Ventures, investing since 2008; before Connect she was with Doughty Hanson Technology Ventures, where she led the firm's investment round in SoundCloud. Her focus has centered on consumer and B2B2C enablement, marketplaces, market networks, and networked SaaS, with portfolio companies including ai-coustics, Hopkins, and Deepstash. She holds a dual degree in Mechanical Engineering and Economics from Duke University.

Pietro Bezza is Managing Partner and co-founder of Connect Ventures, specializing in B2B software investing and holding board seats at Typeform, TrueLayer, Oyster, Purple Dot, Aikido, and Plain. Before venture capital, he co-founded and ran Neo Network, a mobile communication platform he grew to $25 million in annual recurring revenue before its 2008 acquisition, and earlier spent five years in product and marketing management at Kraft Foods. He is based in London.

Rory Stirling is General Partner, having joined Connect Ventures in 2019 per contemporaneous TechCrunch reporting, after serving as a Partner at BGF Ventures and MMC Ventures, where he invested in Gousto, NewVoiceMedia, and Brightpearl. At Connect he focuses on product-led fintech, leadership development, and portfolio fundraising support, and holds an MA in Economics from the University of Edinburgh.

Early Portfolio

Connect Ventures has backed more than 120 companies since 2012. Fund V-era portfolio references from the firm's own announcement include ai-coustics (AI infrastructure), Mosaico (robotics), Molecular Glue Labs (techbio), and Aikido Security (cybersecurity), alongside longer-standing portfolio company TrueLayer (fintech infrastructure), where Bezza holds a board seat.

What This Means for Founders

European technical founders building AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, or biotech companies — particularly those who've built deep, earned expertise in a hard problem rather than a generalist product background — are the explicit target for Connect's pre-seed and inception-to-seed checks. The firm's framing is unusually direct about wanting founders who can build what they've seen the market can't yet, so founders whose pitch leans on distribution or growth-hacking savvy over technical depth are likely a weaker fit for this fund than for a more product-led seed investor.

Because the entire investment team is three GPs with no associates, founders who get in front of Connect should expect direct partner engagement from the first meeting rather than being screened by junior staff — but should also expect a correspondingly selective process, since three people covering pre-seed and seed across all of Europe in newly prioritized deep-tech categories can only run so many first meetings per week.

Fund Momentum Take

We think holding fund size flat at $80 million for a third consecutive vintage, while much of the seed market has ballooned around AI hype, is the most interesting signal in this announcement — it's a firm explicitly choosing not to chase assets under management, which usually correlates with better per-check attention and less pressure to deploy into weaker deals just to put capital to work.

The risk is the sector pivot itself. Connect built its brand and thirteen-year track record on product-led, largely software investing; pivoting hard toward AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech means competing directly with specialist deep-tech and biotech seed funds that have built domain-specific diligence networks Connect is only now assembling. Whether the same GP-only team that excelled at spotting product-market fit in SaaS can apply equally sharp judgment to hardware and biotech technical risk is an open question this fund's returns will answer.

Our bet: the founder-LP base is the detail worth watching. A fund whose own portfolio founders choose to re-invest as LPs is being underwritten by people with the best possible information about how the GPs actually behave in the boardroom under pressure — that's a harder credential to fake than any amount of AI-focused positioning, and it's the strongest reason to take Connect's pivot seriously rather than reading it as a narrative chase.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much has Connect Ventures raised for Fund V?
The firm has raised $55 million in a first close toward an $80 million target. Sifted independently confirmed this is a first close, not a final close.

How does Fund V compare in size to Connect's previous funds?
Connect's Fund III closed at $80 million in 2020 and Fund IV closed at $80 million in September 2023. Fund V's $80 million target keeps fund size flat rather than stepping up.

Who runs Connect Ventures?
Managing Partners Sitar Teli and Pietro Bezza, and General Partner Rory Stirling, make up the entire GP-only investment team with no associates.

What does Connect Ventures invest in?
Pre-seed and inception-to-seed European companies with $500k-$5m checks, with Fund V's focus sharpened toward AI infrastructure, robotics, hardware, and biotech.

Who are Connect Ventures' Fund V limited partners?
British Business Bank anchors the fund, with returning LPs Aldea Ventures, Sella Venture Partners, and Molten Ventures, plus European family offices and founders of Connect-backed companies.

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