Tapestry VC closes $80M third fund backing repeat European founders
London-based Tapestry VC closed an $80 million third fund focused on repeat European founders, betting that the wave of AI-driven exits will produce a new generation of experienced entrepreneurs. Partner Patrick Murphy, who relocated from San Francisco back to London, said repeat founders have created over $2 trillion in enterprise value across Europe. The firm plans to invest in roughly 30 companies at pre-seed or seed stage, with check sizes increasing from ~$1M in prior funds to a range of $1M–$3M.
New institutional investors include British Business Bank, pension fund Railpen, and fund-of-funds Molten Ventures. Sarah Friar, CFO at OpenAI, is also an investor. Tapestry's prior portfolio includes Nothing (smartphone/earbud developer), Fin AI (acquired by Salesforce for $3.6 billion), Manna Air Delivery (drone logistics), Sunrise Robotics (manufacturing automation), Tracebit, Maze, and Keycard (AI security).
The firm's approach emphasizes early-stage ideation with experienced founders before they launch their next company—"ideate, brainstorm" with no uptake fee, falling between incubator and pure venture. This de-risks founder-market fit iteration and reduces capital burn in the pre-revenue phase. The fund's timing targets the 2026–2027 window when AI-company exits from 2022–2023 will release capital and talent back into the ecosystem.
For architects and practitioners, the focus on repeat founders reinforces the industry pattern: experienced teams with prior exits command investor confidence and can hire faster. The influx of new venture capital into European deeptech and AI security signals that geographic arbitrage on founder talent and lower operational costs in Europe remains attractive to LPs betting on AI-driven infrastructure, particularly around AI security (Tracebit, Maze)—a persistent category funding across Tapestry's bets.
Sources
- Primary source
- news.crunchbase.com
“London-based Tapestry VC has closed an $80 million third fund to double down on what it believes is one of Europe's biggest long-term advantages: repeat founders.”
- sifted.eu
“Tapestry VC partner Audrey Miller and founder Patrick Murphy. Tapestry says entrepreneurs starting their second or third companies have created more than $2 trillion in enterprise value across Europe.”
- news.crunchbase.com
“From its new fund, Tapestry plans to invest in a similar number of companies as it did with prior funds: Around 30 companies at pre-seed or seed. Prior fund check sizes were around $1 million but checks from the new fund will trend larger, from around $1 million to $3 million.”