WVC:E Women in Venture Capital Europe Summit 2024

Our CEO, Sarah Kocianski, joined the panellists on the main stage as the MC at the WVC:E Summit 2024 last week. In this reflection, she shares her key takeaways and insights from this year’s event.

WVC:E, Women in Venture Capital Europe’s, annual summit is a highlight in the calendar of many in the investing industry for good reason. It brings together people from across the venture capital and adjacent industries to talk about the future of investing in an informal, friendly setting where honesty and transparency are the dominant principles in conversation.

Having worked with the organisation since its inception, it was an honour to be asked to MC the main stage this year. The insights shared throughout the conference are too many to list, but here are the main themes from the panels and fireside chats I saw.

Founders are increasingly purpose-driven. During the first panel of the day it was highlighted that one of the major shifts that has occurred in the world of entrepreneurship in the last few years is that founders are more likely than not to be purpose driven. They want their companies to drive societal change for the better, and they want their investors’ goals and beliefs to align with their own. That means founders are being more selective, and investors should be thinking seriously about what their mission is, beyond getting returns.

AI isn’t going anywhere. On several occasions speakers said they were trying not to mention AI, but the topic was unavoidable. There is excitement around technologies in this field among investors, but also caution around the volume of startups and an awareness that many companies exploring them, and basing their business models on them, are highly capital intensive. That means smaller VC funds are much less likely to be able to participate in rounds of this nature, and founders need to be ready to explain their USP and path to profitability in detail.

Dragons, not unicorns. Kerry Baldwin, Managing Partner and Co-Founder at IQ capital, pointed out that smaller funds should be looking for dragons, that one investment that will repay the whole fund, rather than multiple million-pound valued unicorns. My ears perked up at the mention of dragons, but Baldwin’s point is a valid one in the current environment where valuations are settling back to pre-bubble levels.

Everyone needs to separate who they are from what they do. Rosie Popa, olympic gold medallist, spoke eloquently about how to recover from career setbacks by separating your own self worth from professional success. Sophie Winwood, the CEO of WVCE who was leading the fireside discussion, pointed out that the same should be true for investors and founders — just because a company fails, it doesn’t mean the people associated with them have too. The quote of the session was “Stay on your own side”.

There is momentum in investing. The news many want to hear is that it’s a good time to be raising (for both companies and funds). Larger, well-capitalised funds have survived recent turbulence and are now starting to deploy capital again. And while some smaller VC funds will fall by the wayside, there will still be space for the strongest of them to thrive. For companies hoping to raise, the key advice was to have the ability to articulate purpose and path to profitability, and to take time to find investors whose expertise aligns with their biggest needs.

The event was a wonderful opportunity for me to meet with investor friends old and new, and to highlight the vibrant startup ecosystem in Wales. A few of them will be visiting us in Cardiff over the next few months, so stay tuned for more information on upcoming events.