Breaking: Holtzbrinck Ventures and HarbourVest closes €177m early stage fund

We’ve just learned that German VC Holtzbrinck Ventures will announce that it’s closed a whopping €177 million early stage fund tomorrow. The Holtzbrinck Ventures Fund IV is backed by both Georg von Holtzbrinck publishing group and funds managed by HarbourVest Partners, a global private equity investment firm.

This is a significant new fund for European standards and will fundamentally help prosper and establish consumer web startups from all walks. Current investments and holdings include highly successful ventures, such as Zalando, Groupon or the freshly exited brands4friends.

With the recent re-structuring at Holtzbrinck, a new corporate identity and the following shut down of the so-called incubator “eLab“, these developments now also entail that the fund will be operated and managed independently and solely focused on early stage Internet startups.

Martin Weber, Partner of Holtzbrinck Ventures, says that “the level of support shown by our existing investor Holtzbrinck has been very encouraging, and we are also delighted to welcome HarbourVest as a new investor both of whom we look forward to working with in the coming years.”

Holtzbrinck also claims that the new money will be used for a pragmatic and simple funding approach for fresh ideas and disruptive startups coming out of Europe. There is definitely need for a fund of such size that also has a strong existing portfolio.