TechCrunch August 29
The Samwer brothers’ Global Founders Capital fund is announcing its first three investments today, a few short months after making its public debut. The initial round of investment isn’t earth-shattering, totaling just over $5 million, but it’s just the start for the nearly $200 million fund from Oliver and Marc Samwer, as well as third partner Fabian Siegel, the founder and architect of global food ordering startup giant Delivery Hero.
Three companies are included in this round of initial funding, including language learning platform Lingoda (previously scooped by Deutsche Startups), and online fashion startups GirlMeetsDress and Videdressing.com. GFC‘s Siegel says that the fund’s partners see big opportunities in the online fashion space, hence the presence of two such companies on this list of investments.
“I can’t speak for [Rocket Internet’s] specific strategy, but I think they’re covering very well the traditional, demand fulfillment ecommerce space for fashion,” he said in an interview. “But there are tons of other models adjacent to that. The secondary market, with Videdressing, where you start to resell and build an eBay is a good example of a natural, logical model adjacent to the ecommerce model. GirlMeetsDress, being on the other end, where you basically make high-end dresses available to those who are unable or unwilling to own them, basically with a shared ownership model, you have another different approach.”
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