This week, we’d like to open the newsletter by sharing something close to home. At Kfund, we believe that investing in early-stage companies means more than analyzing financials or market trends — it’s about deeply understanding the technology that powers the companies we back. That’s why we’re proud to be one of the few funds in Spain with a dedicated CTO, Juanjo Mostazo, who plays a key role in our investment process. His latest blog post offers a behind-the-scenes look at how we approach technical due diligence (TDD) and why it’s such a critical part of our decision-making.

Unlike many funds that treat technical assessment as a formality or outsource it altogether, we view TDD as a collaborative process between our team and the founding engineers. Our goal is not to act as auditors but as partners who can help technical founders navigate both the challenges and opportunities that come with scaling technology. We evaluate factors like code quality, team structure, product architecture, and technical debt, always with a founder-friendly approach that focuses on improvement rather than judgment.

Juanjo’s post also touches on how we adapt the depth of our TDD to the stage of the startup — focusing on agility and adaptability at pre-seed and seed stages, while paying closer attention to aspects like security, scalability, and documentation in later rounds. Importantly, the way we approach TDD allows us to better understand product and technical risks early on, which in turn strengthens our conviction when we invest.

We encourage you to check out the full article — and if you’re a technical founder building something ambitious, we’d love to hear from you.

Kfund Tech Due Diligence

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This week’s newsletter is brought to you by Didit:

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¿Quién lo sufre dentro de tu empresa?

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Más de 500 empresas ya han cambiado. ¿Y tú? 👉 Contáctanos para saber más

Startup funding news 💸

€50M to €100M` financings:

• Barcelona-based HR tech unicorn Factorial has secured $120M (~€110M) in fresh funding from General Catalyst to fuel its sales and marketing expansion, particularly across Europe. The debt facility from General Catalyst is a non-dilutive, revenue-backed credit line disbursed quarterly over four years. Repayments are tied to the company’s SaaS subscription revenues, allowing Factorial to fund growth without issuing new equity. In an interview, CEO Jordi Romero shared that he expects the company to reach €100M in ARR this year. Factorial is a Kfund portfolio co. He also talked about it with Bernat here

• Madrid-based Playtomic raised €65M to accelerate its expansion in the US and Europe, aiming to boost padel’s popularity. The round includes €10M in debt from Santander and €55M in equity led by Match Invest and LFH. The platform surpassed €240M in gross revenue in 2024 and now operates in 63 countries. Co-founder Pedro Claveri wrote about the investment here

€10M to €20M+:

• Barcelona-based Pangea Aerospace raised €23M from investors including Hyperion, CDTI Innvierte, and Primo, to advance its space propulsion technology

• Crossmint, a US-based Web3 infrastructure startup founded by Spaniards, raised $24M (€22M) from Ribbit Capital, Franklin Templeton, and others to expand its developer platform for blockchain and digital asset applications

€1M to €10M:

• Icosium Investment has acquired a 14.1% stake in Holaluz through a €6.5M capital increase, marking the first tranche of a €22M investment. The Barcelona-based fund aims to raise its share to 33% and become the renewable energy firm’s top shareholder

• Irisbond, a Basque startup specialized in AI-powered eye-tracking technology for assistive communication, raised €4.5M

• Eiffel Investment Group committed €2M to Cuatroochenta, a Spanish SaaS provider, to support its growth strategy. The funding will help the company continue its M&A activity and strengthen its position in the digital transformation and cybersecurity sectors. Cuatroochenta is listed on BME Growth and plans to consolidate its presence in Spain and Latin America

Other rounds of funding: Ovianta (€540k), Carina AI (€500k)

M&A 🎉

Deporvillage, owned by JD Sports, has seen stagnating sales and a 65% drop in net profit over the past three years. The company’s revenue peaked at €160M in 2021, but profitability has since eroded. Former CEO and co-founder Xavier Pladellorens published a rant about the difficult relationship between acquirers and acquired companies, focusing on what he believes is mismanagement from JD Sports that has led to the current status of Deporvillage

Indra acquired Málaga-based Clue Tech for €39.8M to strengthen its defense and aerospace business. Clue Tech, specialized in electronic systems for aircraft, works on projects with Airbus, Navantia, and Indra itself

Vocento sold Pisos.com to Italian group Immobiliare.it for €22.5M

US cybersecurity firm Lumu acquired Maltiverse, a Spanish startup specialized in threat intelligence

Luis Pareras, managing partner of Spanish fund Invivo Ventures, shared that only 16 months after their first investment in EsoBiotech, a French cancer therapy company, the company has been acquired by Astrazeneca for up to €1B

Boopos, the Spanish fintech focused on providing acquisition financing to entrepreneurs, has been acquired by US-based Founderpath. Boopos is a Kfund portfolio company

LTP, a major Asia-based institutional crypto broker, acquired Spanish crypto brokerage Turing Capital Brokerage (TCB)

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

Adara Ventures has completed the first close of its AV4 fund at €75M, reaching 75% of its €100M target. The fund will focus on seed-stage investments in cybersecurity, AI, healthtech, hardware, and space tech. Backers include BBVA, EIF, CDTI, Cofides, and several family offices

Enzo Ventures is preparing a second fund targeting €30M-€40M to invest in early-stage startups in Southern Europe. The firm focuses on pre-seed deals

Two analysis of investment activity from corporates:

• A look at Elewit, Redeia’s CVC platform, which nearly doubled its startup investments in 2024 to €3.7M. It backed Splight, Unusuals, and Stellar, and became an anchor investor in Adara Ventures Energy I, a €120M fund targeting early-stage energy transition startups. Elewit also increased its commitments to funds like Adara Ventures III and Cardumen Fund I

• Inditex expanded its startup portfolio in 2024, investing in Infinited Fiber, Galy, and Epoch Biodesign via its fund managed by Mundi Ventures. Investments focus on biotech and circular economy startups, aligned with Inditex’s Sustainability Innovation Hub
  

Startup news 💡

Company financials:

• Novicap closed 2024 with a 28% revenue increase, driven by the growth of its working capital solutions, including supply chain finance and factoring. It has financed more than €2B since being founded

New startups and products/features:

• Bartek Kunowski, former CPO at Glovo, wrote about ara, his new startup. The company is trying to reinvent meetings for remote and hybrid teams

• A Coruña-based YepCode launched YepCode Run on Product Hunt, a serverless runtime and SDK that lets AI agents execute generated code securely and seamlessly

• Deblock, a London-based fintech founded by former Revolut executives, entered Spain with its self-custodial crypto wallet integrated into a current account

• Valencia-based Quibim received FDA clearance for its QP-Prostate software, an AI-powered tool for detecting and diagnosing prostate lesions

• PcComponentes launched its first SaaS product in partnership with startup Internxt, a secure cloud storage service with military-grade encryption

Startup profiles:

• David Camprubi, a 24-year-old entrepreneur from Catalonia, has turned his sneaker reselling hobby into Newcop, a business generating €7M annually with nearly 30,000 orders in 2024. Newcop sells online and also through retail stores

Lists:

• EU-Startups has highlighted 10 promising Spanish startups to watch in 2025

Other news:

Urbanitae closed its first hotel financing deal, raising €5M for the Occidental Roca Negra hotel in Gran Canaria. The transaction marks Urbanitae’s debut in the hospitality sector

The Bank of Spain authorized German neobank Trade Republic to operate as a local branch and offer Spanish IBAN current accounts

Big company & policy news 🤓

Santander is bolstering its leadership team with a wave of tech-focused hires from firms like PayPal, Amazon, BBVA, and Stripe to accelerate its digital transformation. The bank has recruited over 10 executives in a year, including Nitin Prabhu (ex-PayPal) to lead its global Digital Consumer Bank, Ricardo Martín Manjón (ex-BBVA) as Chief Data & AI Officer, and Swati Bhatia (ex-Marcus, Stripe) for its US retail banking

Booking CEO Glenn Fogel reaffirmed the company’s commitment to Spain despite the CNMC’s €413M fine, which has been temporarily suspended by Spain’s Audiencia Nacional. Fogel criticized the ruling and called for clearer regulations that foster innovation

Telefónica Brasil (Vivo) acquired i2GO, a leading Brazilian smartphone accessories brand, for up to BRL 80M (€13M)

Interesting reads 🤓

Oscar Martinez, who writes Built in Europe, published an analysis of “CitizenX: Citizenship By Investment”

Ignacio Arriaga published “En el SaaS no siempre gana el que más puede invertir”. Thread with more info here

Toni Perez, co-founder of Harmonix (previously Bloobirds), wrote about his experience raising funding and the pros and cons of having VCs in your cap table. More here and here

Good thread from Eduardo Manchon about how treating entrepreneurs well can lead to bigger outcomes

Jesús Monleón (4Founders Capital, GoTrendier) sharerd a reflection on a founder who delayed Social Security payments, sparking a debate about survival tactics in startups. Some, like Pablo Grueso (sold TecnoFor to Sngular), argue that using SS or tax deferrals is a valid short-term financing move that helped them survive and even exit successfully. Others, like David Bonilla (Petalo), warn of severe personal and legal risks if mishandled

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