“Unicorns” were originally termed as private companies greater than $1 billion enterprise value. Fast forward to today, and that is no longer rare. There are thousands of global private companies that exceed $1 billion in value. Regardless, we define “unicorn” as the largest one hundred (or so) private companies in the world. We do get access to the staple class of unicorns (e.g., SpaceX, Stripe, Anduril, Reddit, Epic Games, Chime, etc.) that have brought disruption to the market and are changing the world…
… But we also find value picking through the stones to source off-the-run, niche private companies – often across the European landscape – that we believe can add incremental return potential for our venture LPs.
A recent example of that was our investment in a company called “Raisin”. In the middle of 2023, we sourced access to Raisin and invested in the company.
And just two quarters later, the Raisin valuation has been marked up by +60.8% (as of 12/31/2023). This markup is net of SPV fees and expenses.
The Raisin deal was a privately negotiated secondary tender at a €1bn entry valuation for the company. Hedosophia – one of the top EU venture sponsors based in London and run by renowned venture investor Ian Osborne – syndicated us co-investment access to Raisin. Hedosophia is a greater than 10% shareholder in Raisin and has great access and transparency to company management.
Raisin was established in 2013 in Germany as a marketplace for savings accounts. Simply put, the company connects consumers seeking high interest-rate savings products with banks aiming to source funding. The company earns an AUM-based fee from banks (for deposits) and from savers (for investment products).
In 2023, Raisin reached €57bn of AUM, representing +73% YoY growth, with particularly strong performance in Raisin’s international markets. Notably, the company added €5.3bn of net inflows in the U.S., resulting in more than 5x AUM growth. The company generated €178m in 2023 revenue, representing +107% YoY growth, while simultaneously reaching profitability, driven by significant improvements in customer acquisition cost (CAC) and scale across the P&L. From an operational perspective, Raisin successfully hired a new U.S. CEO and launched its U.S. mobile app. In Europe, the company expanded to Poland in Q4 2023 and made strong progress with the post-merger integration of Deposit Solutions. This has enabled operating efficiencies and increased top-line due to higher negotiating leverage, driving 5 to 10 basis points in higher fees for newly signed deposit-taking-bank partners of Raisin.
So, while most investors have never heard of Raisin, we believe they soon will.
Raisin connects consumers seeking high interest-rate savings products