Scaling Europe
00:00:00 · Sebastian Johnson, Carlos Trenchs Sainz de la Maza
[00:00:00] S0: Hello, and welcome back to the Scaling Europe show. Today on the show, we've Carlos. Carlos is one of the cofounders of Masia, which has just announced closing its fund, €18,000,000. Amazing news. Congratulations. How are doing today? [00:00:10] S1: Fantastic. Thank you for joining, and and happy to join you. [00:00:14] S0: It is my absolute pleasure. You know, I'm a huge fan of what you and everyone is doing. Barcelona, the ecosystem is flying. But for those who don't know, can you kinda give a a quick introduction to the fund? [00:00:24] S1: Yeah. So Masia is an angel fund based here in Barcelona. I think that there is three characteristics that are quite unique. One is some pre seed fund trying to back founders connected with the city. And I will take later on what means connected. The second is, this is a fund that although it's small, is backed with 70 plus individuals as LPs. Most of them successful founders with experience in the city, senior tech leaders, and other well known investors. And all of them with this idea not to to help better connect Barcelona ecosystem, no, with the with the rest of the world. And the third point that is also quite interesting is we invest in a collaborative way and we try to help better connect the founders here with the best funds globally. And we help create these connections and these, I would say, relationships among some pan European or global funds trying to scout correctly, you know, what is happening in this ecosystem.
00:00:24 · Carlos Trenchs Sainz de la Maza, Sebastian Johnson
[00:00:24] S1: Yeah. So Masia is an angel fund based here in Barcelona. I think that there is three characteristics that are quite unique. One is some pre seed fund trying to back founders connected with the city. And I will take later on what means connected. The second is, this is a fund that although it's small, is backed with 70 plus individuals as LPs. Most of them successful founders with experience in the city, senior tech leaders, and other well known investors. And all of them with this idea not to to help better connect Barcelona ecosystem, no, with the with the rest of the world. And the third point that is also quite interesting is we invest in a collaborative way and we try to help better connect the founders here with the best funds globally. And we help create these connections and these, I would say, relationships among some pan European or global funds trying to scout correctly, you know, what is happening in this ecosystem. [00:01:33] S0: Amazing. So talk talk me through that first point around Barcelona, you know, like Barcelona connected. Why? What's your thesis around Barcelona at the moment?
00:01:41 · Carlos Trenchs Sainz de la Maza
[00:01:41] S1: So far, this is this is my bet. No. But I I think that Barcelona today is in this inflection point. So where if things are going as expected, probably in five, six years, the amount invested and the number of companies can be five, six, seven times the size that is today. And this is thanks to three different things. Now the first one is, this ecosystem mature. So it means that in this moment we have around 200 founders that previously sold companies. So they have the right level of ambition and to start again, no, with with another, I will say, more global focus. Second, they have some money, no, and and and they can also back other first time investor, founders, no, in in the things. So I think this is very important. The second is Barcelona is becoming a international talent magnet. Know? I think the quality of life here is helping to attract good talent from almost everywhere in Europe and and America. And and this talent, most of them are also founding companies, or they have companies in the swede... Swedish, Sweden, London, Germany, other, but they live here. No. The CEO live here. No? And and this helps not to to increase the connection. No? And the third is Barcelona today have different research centres and specifically in the AI world, we have the Barcelona Supercomputing Centre. This is one of the largest facilities in in Europe, you know, regarding AI. And around this centre are emerging different kinds of founders and initiatives that are being very important. So especially in AI today, the number of companies that are emerging in the city is quite, quite massive. So for these three reasons, mature ecosystem, international talent, and I will say the new wave of AI, you know, around different facilities, things are still happening. The last point is money is not local anymore. So today, European and global funds are investing almost everywhere. So, probably Spain has a lack of, size, no, in terms of the number of PCs and growth funds. But in Barcelona, every week there are six, seven, eight funds, no, scouting, and coming from different parts of Europe. No. So I think that as VC is becoming at least a regional business, no, it's very easy to fundraise from other things.
00:04:13 · Sebastian Johnson
[00:04:13] S0: And how did you find the fundraising process itself going out and raising that fund from as you mentioned, 70 LPs, did that thesis around Barcelona, did that resonate with a lot of the ecosystem and all the LPs that you've got? Or did you kind of have to sell them on the vision?
00:04:28 · Carlos Trenchs Sainz de la Maza
[00:04:28] S1: So my previous experience, as you know, I co founded Aldea Ventures, that is one of the largest, I would say South European fan of funds, And we back emerging managers, no? So what we realized when we were in Aldea is that the new generation of, VCs, that back, precede and sit rounds, were mostly focused on those, I will say, established ecosystems. London, Paris, Berlin, Munich, Zurich, a little bit on the on the Nordics. So outside this ecosystem, you know, they only invest opportunistically. And and we saw clearly an opportunity to connect. So I start, no, as I did angel investing, no? So identify one founder and instead of putting my money, so let's connect with this, I would say, two, three specialized funds. And if they decide to invest, I will co invest with them. So I started doing this one, two, three times, you know, and it happened. So I saw an opportunity to say, look, there is an opportunity to scout locally, you know, and connect internationally. And at the same time, if any of these funds, no, have a portfolio company with a founder that wants to be relocated to the city, we can help them, no, to to to better. So I start sharing this vision, no, among other people? No? You know my friend, Tidak Lee, no, and other, I would say, well known individuals in in in the city. And everyone realized the same. So we decided, okay, let's start the fun, no, and let's pitch, no, to other individuals that think things the same. No? So I think that, we started with the first 20. With the first 20, we we did the first close of the fund. And we start doing investments, no, at the same path as we were adding other other LPs. No? So finally, in July, we closed the fund with this 18,000,000, 70 plus individual investors. And but at the time we have now 45 portfolio companies. So I think that we built in parallel, the fundraising process and the portfolio construction.
00:06:31 · Sebastian Johnson
[00:06:31] S0: It talks to a bit about the portfolio because you've already got some companies within the portfolio that have gone on to raise some mammoth rounds from some of the best investors in the world. Can you maybe pick out a few of those most exciting companies?