SOFIA (Bulgaria), August 16 (SeeNews) – Romanian tech investment platform SeedBlink announced on Tuesday that it has acquired Netherlands-based investment crowdfunding platform Symbid in a bid to significantly expand its pool of investors and consolidate its European footprint.

The transaction will add to SeedBlink’s wealthy network, bringing the combined total of individual investors to 62,000 and the combined investments of the two platforms to more than €110 million ($111.7 million) in 250 start-ups at today, the buyer said in a press release. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.

You can subscribe to our M&A newsletter here

Thanks to this acquisition, the Romanian fintech will also benefit from additional connections with Symbid’s partner banks, venture capital funds and angel investors.

“Both companies have made a name for themselves offering private investors access to curated European start-up opportunities, so it’s a natural move to seek out the European consolidation game,” said Ionut Patrahau, co- SeedBlink founder and head of business development. . He added that the combination of the two companies will build on the complementary advantages of the Eastern and Western models to strengthen portfolio diversification and investment infrastructure.

SeedBlink, which continues to seek new investment opportunities across Europe, has its eye on France and the Czech Republic as potential areas for expansion, a company spokesperson said. at SeeNews.

Founded in 2011, Rotterdam-based Symbid has developed an investor community of 50,000 people. In the decade to the end of 2021, the Dutch company has backed more than 180 start-ups, more than a third of them in technology, through equity deals and convertible loans worth 35 million euros.

According to Symbid founder Robin Slakhorst, the merger will create a proprietary digital financial infrastructure and a secondary investment market, in which individuals and professional investors across Europe can interact.

Going forward, Symbid will lead the combined company’s investment activity in the Benelux region, in which it is traditionally strong and which SeedBlink also prioritizes in its expansion plans.

Launched in early 2020, SeedBlink has helped raise over €75 million in seed investment, attracting over 12,000 individual investors from 60 countries. It backs European tech companies from pre-seed through Series B funding stages and has a portfolio of 62 start-ups, including Hungarian fintech FlowX, Bulgarian cargo drone developer Dronamics, start-up Serbian Marketing Automation Hunch and the AI-powered Romanian Virtual. Druid business assistant provider. Elsewhere in South Eastern Europe (SEE), SeedBlink has offices in Bulgaria and Greece.

In June, the Romanian fintech launched a secondary market for investors.

($ = 0.9844 euro)