Cherry Ventures

What do you call a crisp Spring day filled with talks from Europe's tech leaders hosted at one of London's most iconic venues? Ah, yes — the #CherrySummit2024. Alongside networking and entertainment, we built a program around the opportunities ahead for European tech, with many of the stories and insights shared stemming straight from our portfolio and our close network. Check out our showreel below:

We, at Cherry, believe in the power of learning from real-life interactions. When we began organising intimate dinner series for the technical community over a year ago, we realised there weren't many events where genuine tech challenges could be discussed with peers. Since then, we've hosted numerous dinners across London, Berlin, and Paris, now known as The Engine Room Dinner.🍒 This past Wednesday, our London-based investor Nadja Carina Reischel got the chance to put technical discussions on an even larger stage by co-hosting the AI Demo Days with the incredible Matt Carey and Marie-Caroline Pasquier at Cohere London office! The room was filled with over 75 founders and engineers and we had four incredible demos: 💡Patrick Lewis from Cohere and Director of Machine Learning shared insights into building the next generation of augmented language models. By integrating citation mechanisms and enabling interaction with complex external tools like search APIs, Cohere’s model empowers developers to create more robust and reliable AI systems. Patrick demonstrated how the model plans and breaks down tasks by asking it to analyse the efficiency of the top 5 tech companies, showcasing a form of agentic reasoning and action. Biggest learning: Everyone is compute bound! 💡Allis Yao from Workflow Design Co. and the engineer behind some of our favourite Instagram story features demonstrated a platform that unleashes project management for creative teams. With features like AI-driven prompts to flag potential design issues and checks for last-minute changes, it’s like Google Docs meets Figma meets tailored language models. 💡Henry Scott-Green from Context.ai and ex-Google Lead PM tackled a significant challenge in the LLM space: bridging the gap between product functionality and user value. Their analytics tool provides deep insights into user interactions with LLM products, replacing customer log and transcript reading with a comprehensive dashboard of user behaviour analytics. This innovation is crucial for understanding and improving the value of LLM-based systems. 💡Nolan Di Mare Sullivan from Speakeasy introduced a product that promises to revolutionise the way developers build with APIs. Speakeasy is building Robust SDKs, Terraform Providers and a toolkit to power quality REST API development at scale. By layering AI on top of deterministic models, they ensure consistency and efficiency, significantly reducing the time developers spend on building SDKs. Huge shoutout to everyone who demoed and to StackOne, Romain Sestier, Guillaume Lebedel, Cohere, Ivan Zhang, Maxime Voisin! If you are building or looking to join our next event, feel free to reach out to 👉 Nadja Carina Reischel Filip Felician Dames Christian Meermann Jasper Masemann Alexander Langholz-Baikousis Sophia Bendz Dinika Mahtani

In line with our guiding principle to always put founders first, we're thrilled to release our first ever live founder coaching session! 🍒 Our very own Lutz Finger hosted a live founder coaching session for three pioneering startups looking to revolutionise neurological care with AI: Zenith, Abstractive Health, and Neuralenz. Taking place at Cornell Tech, a graduate school and research center based in New York City, we gave the founders Shiang-Wan Chin, Vince Hartman & Oybek Kholiqov tips for their AI journey and how to navigate the following key aspects: 💡 Product value proposition and market fit 💡 Technical approach and workflow integration 💡 Business model and revenue streams 💡 Strategic focus and competitive landscape Learn how your peers are leveraging AI from our summary 👉 https://lnkd.in/dSS8zYZs …or listen to the whole session in the newest episode of The Edge, our podcast breaking down the latest developments in AI 🎧 bit.ly/cherryedge CC: Filip Felician Dames, Christian Meermann, Alexander Langholz-Baikousis, Sophia Bendz, Dinika Mahtani, Jasper Masemann

Huge congratulations to our portfolio company bunch for raising $15.5 million in their Series A round! 🎉 As proud investors since 2021, it's been an incredible journey watching you take your offering to new heights in such a short amount of time. This milestone is a testament to your team's hard work and vision in revolutionizing the private markets. We're thrilled to continue supporting your journey alongside Motive Ventures and FinTech Collective, and can't wait to celebrate many more milestones together! 🍒 Read more about their story here 👇 Filip Felician Dames Christian Meermann Alexander Langholz-Baikousis Sophia Bendz Dinika Mahtani Jasper Masemann

We're witnessing a transformative era where AI, especially large language models (LLMs), is revolutionizing industries ⭐️ At Cherry Ventures, we are looking for investment, and our investment theses on AI hinges on two main categories: Evolution: AI is continuously improving existing processes, enhancing efficiency across sectors. For instance, AI-driven chatbots and workflow automation are saving time and reducing errors in fields like healthcare and manufacturing. By automating mundane tasks, AI allows employees to focus on complex, value-added activities. Revolution: AI is creating groundbreaking transformations, from personalized information interfaces to smart hardware. Imagine AI providing instant, relevant data to enhance decision-making or integrating with hardware to make devices smarter and more efficient. Our very own Jasper Masemann and Lutz Finger now share their insights on the six hypotheses illustrating the evolution and revolution in AI. Read about our AI investment theses here 👉 https://lnkd.in/dVdcYwET  …or listen all about them in the newest episode of The Edge 🎧 bit.ly/cherryedge

Rising momentum.🍒 That's how we introduce our summer newsletter, reflecting on the first half of the year that flew by, filled with memorable moments with our founders and broader community. We gathered the brightest minds in European tech to discuss the future opportunities in the field in The Cherry Summit 2024. We also introduced Copilot, offering executive, curated coaching as a part of our investment package to provide value beyond capital. Additionally, we've welcomed Lutz Finger as a venture partner in San Francisco to help founders integrate AI into their products, with insights shared on our podcast, The Edge. From space exploration to AI breakthroughs, our portfolio companies continue to drive tech forward in Europe. We're privileged to be part of our founders’ journey and grateful for the opportunities ahead. See what the Cherry team and portfolio companies have been up to in our latest newsletter 👉 https://lnkd.in/dAc7dAvF Don’t forget to subscribe to our newsletter 📩 https://cherry.vc/en/news Listen to The Edge and hear all about the latest developments in AI 🎧 https://lnkd.in/enbv362B

Why is this new AI hype so special? In the latest episode of The Edge, our very own podcast looking into the latest AI developments, Lutz Finger and Jasper Masemann are unpacking the current AI hype and discussing AI’s limitations. Can you answer these questions correctly? 💡If we say “Life is like a box of…”, you’ll say “chocolate.” But what if AI said “sensations?” 💡Who has more impressions, a large language model or a four-year-old? 💡Can Lutz convince OpenAI that he’s Captain America? Read the summary here 👉 https://lnkd.in/dC63yxGx ...or tune in and learn 🎧 bit.ly/cherryedge #AI #LLM

Hot off the press! Our portfolio company Numa has acquired Native Places. Huge congratulations are in order for Numa founders Christian Gaiser, Dimitri Chandogin, Gerhard Maringer, and the entire Numa team for this strategic expansion into the UK market! Here's why we’re excited: 💂🏽♀️ Native Places’ strong presence in four key UK locations adds 16 landmark properties in London, Manchester, Edinburgh, and Glasgow. 🎒 Numa’s total group count is now 7,300 units, thanks to 800 additional units in AAA locations and strong real estate partners. 😍 Numa will keep building on Native's delightful lifestyle brand, which already has exceptional recognition. The UK remains an attractive travel market as London, Edinburgh and Manchester each rank within the most visited cities in Europe. This acquisition allows an even stronger player to provide high-quality stopovers close to rich cultural experiences, historic landmarks, vibrant cityscapes, and dominant business hubs. cc: Christian Meermann Filip Felician Dames Alexander Langholz-Baikousis Sophia Bendz Dinika Mahtani Jasper Masemann #NumaStays #StaysWithSoul #nativeplaces

Big News: EQT and Kühne Holding Acquire 35% Stake in Flix! We are absolutely thrilled to share that EQT Future and Kühne Holding have acquired a 35% stake in our portfolio company, Flix! This is a huge milestone for Flix, one that brings in strategic investors who will empower them with industry-leading knowledge and expertise, strengthening their balance sheet and supporting their ambitious growth plans. We have been a proud partner since day one. When we first met the Flix team at their small offices in Munich, before the first green bus ever hit the streets, we knew they were onto something huge. We believed in them and believed that they were building something that would change the way we travel, and that’s exactly what they did. Nowadays, you can’t hit the road anywhere in Europe without seeing one of their iconic green buses, and this latest investment is a clear vote of confidence as Flix looks to expand further in North America and beyond the 43 countries it now operates in. We extend our heartfelt congratulations to André Schwämmlein, Jochen Engert, Daniel Krauss, and the entire Flix team for reaching this significant milestone. We look forward to supporting Flix as they continue to revolutionize the mobility industry. More info here: https://lnkd.in/eUhXBQG7 #CherryVentures #Flix #EQT #KühneHolding #Investment #Growth #ESG #Mobility cc: Christian Meermann Filip Felician Dames Sophia Bendz Alexander Langholz-Baikousis Dinika Mahtani Jasper Masemann

With cyber threats constantly evolving, how can organisations integrate solutions that meet those threats, without introducing more complexity into their stack? Our very own investor, Dimitri Sedashev has the run-down on the most innovative, fit-for-purpose cybersecurity solutions in an evolving threat landscape, from AI to USPM. He also covers some of the emerging frontrunner providers in the field, driving innovative and adopting new technologies to keep organisations safe, without compromising on efficiency. Learn more about their growing relevance and adoption across the field in our newest article, covering: 🔐 Improving MTTD and MTTR 🔐 Transforming Security with Continuous Exposure Management 🔐 Rise of Data in Unified Security Management 🔐 New AI Security Tools Get acquainted: https://lnkd.in/eKFFEcHr #cybersecurity #AI #DevOps #USPM