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Europe's €3.29B VC Wave: Deep-Tech, Defense & the Repeat-Founder Premium
Audio is available on Spreaker — see link below.
Over €3.29B has flooded into European venture in 2026, concentrated almost entirely in deep-tech, defense, and AI infrastructure. From Kembara's €750M deep-tech conviction fund to Together AI's $800M open-source raise, this episode breaks down who's deploying, why, and what the market is actually pricing in.
Audio is available on Spreaker — see link below.
Three point two nine billion euros. That's how much capital has concentrated into Europe's top ten venture vehicles so far in twenty twenty-six, and nearly all of it is pointed at the same targets: deep-tech, defense, and AI infrastructure.
Right behind Kembara is E2D, a Franco-German joint venture between Earlybird and AVP, launching a five hundred million euro DefenceTech growth fund. Their thesis is specific: they're targeting the twenty-five million euro ticket gap in Europe's dual-use and defense scaling market.
Seedcamp adds another two hundred seventy-nine million euros to the pile, split between a one hundred ninety-two million euro seed fund and an eighty-seven million euro select growth vehicle. That's part of what amounts to an eight hundred seventy-seven million euro plus wave in European early-stage funding in twenty twenty-six.
Ashton Kutcher has left Sound Ventures, the firm he co-founded with Guy Oseary eleven years ago. Sound built its reputation on concentrated bets in frontier AI labs, early positions in OpenAI, Anthropic, and World Labs.
The largest single AI infrastructure round of twenty twenty-six also landed this cycle. Together AI raised eight hundred million dollars, led by Aramco Ventures, with Nvidia and Salesforce in the syndicate.
One more development worth tracking: Orbit Capital's one hundred seven million euro Fund Two, a Czech-Polish venture-debt platform, surpassed its seventy million euro target. EIF and PFR backing confirms that institutional capital in Central and Eastern Europe now treats venture debt as a legitimate equity-preserving growth tool, not a fallback option.
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