(Munich, Germany): – Stryber, one of Europe's leading independent corporate venture builders, today published the Annual Corporate Venturing Report - Europe. The report focuses on corporate venture capital (CVC), mergers & acquisitions (M&A) and corporate venture building (CVB). "COVID-19 demonstrated why diversification and the development of new business models were urgently needed, and proved to be an accelerator for digital transformation. Based on our experience with our customers throughout the pandemic, we'd in fact say we've seen a decade's worth of digital transformation in two years," said Alex Mahr, Co-Founder of Stryber. "Our new normal is that shareholders are actively pushing for new growth and business models - along with CVC, especially M&A or venture building - the two most important innovation vehicles in terms of impact and speed."

The most important report results (excerpt) 

Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) 

● According to Stryber, CVC funding volumes are continuously growing since the past years. Funding rounds and deal volumes increased significantly in 2021 compared to last year, while the total number of CVC deals shrinks, implying larger average deal sizes. ● The UK leads Europe’s top 10 countries for largest CVC deal volume, as well as the highest number of deals. The prominent positions of Sweden and the Netherlands on the top of the list can be explained by big-ticket rounds such as Visa’s investment into Swedish buy-now-pay-later company Klarna or the $800m Series C funding round for the Dutch Messagebird. 

● Stryber expects 2022 to be another record year of European corporate venture capital activity, but if interest rates rise as expected, corporates are less likely to be open for high risk investments.

● The hype around quick commerce (Q-commerce) in the last year has not gone unnoticed with German startup Gorillas and its competitor Flink for example raising skyrocketing amounts of funding - quick commerce has benefited in particular from Covid19 restrictions which increased consumer demand for instant grocery delivery all over the world. 

M&A 

● After a slowdown in M&A Activity due to the pandemic, European M&A market has recovered strongly in 2021. M&A deal volume increased by approximately 100% year-over-year mainly in the B2C, energy, health care, and material & resources sectors.

● France tops the list compared to other European countries with the highest company exits reaching $144bn, followed by the UK and Germany. The UK made the most deals with 1,418 exits, which is more than double of the average deal amount in the top 10 countries. 

CVB 

● Overall, the CVB activity in Europe remained at a stable level during 2021, with 15 new ventures disclosed in 2021.

● Germany and France operate the largest amount of CVBs in Europe with 65 and 40 units respectively, followed by the UK and Switzerland. There are clear signals that it will change significantly in the future. Many companies are also shifting away from accelerators and paying more attention to corporate venture building as a method to fulfill their innovation goal.

● The transition to a climate-neutral society is seen by companies as an urgent challenge as well as an opportunity to create a better future for all. The Stryber Report finds that sustainable business models that go hand in hand with this change are attracting growing interest from investors.

Download report:https://www.datocms-assets.com/42975/1647878797-stryber-annual-corporate-venturing-report-march2022.pdf 

About the data collection 

CVB: Data collection through manual and secondary research of companies industry-wide in Europe to identify corporate venture building activities.

CVC: Data basis on Crunchbase database.

M&A: Data basis on Pitchbook database. 

About Stryber 

Stryber, founded in 2016 by Jan Sedlacek and Alexander Mahr, is one of Europe's leading independent corporate venture builders. The internationally expanding company combines approaches from the venture capital and start-up worlds and makes medium-sized companies and corporations fit for the future by building new business areas. While traditional companies invest years in the initiation of new business models and take great risks, the Stryber teams in Zurich, Munich, London, Kiev, Valencia and Abu Dhabi, with a team of now around 100 employees, build up young companies in just a few months and help to scale them further afterwards. Stryber's clients include well-known players from a wide range of industries such as banking, insurance, retail, medicine, pharmaceuticals and real estate, including Steiff, Drees & Sommer, Migros, Stöckli and many more. Stryber regularly publishes exclusive publications with comprehensive CVB data for Europe. www.stryber.com 

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