Cherry Ventures is a Berlin-based early-stage venture firm founded in 2012 by Filip Dames and Christian Meermann, who built and scaled Zalando from startup to IPO before becoming investors. The team's tagline — "founders first, for companies that last" — reflects an operator-led philosophy: it backs ambitious European founders at the earliest stages and keeps a large reserve for follow-ons.

Funds and size

Cherry's fourth fund, Cherry IV, closed at approximately €300 million to lead pre-seed and seed rounds across Europe as first institutional investor. The firm reserves 60% of the fund for follow-on investments — an unusually high figure that signals its intent to stay with winners. Cherry IV added dedicated strategies in crypto and web3 alongside climate and food-tech themes with an emphasis on sustainability. Across its first three funds, the portfolio's aggregate post-money valuation stood at over €23 billion.

The thesis: industry-curious, founder-led

Cherry describes its approach as "industry-curious": from AI to energy to gaming to space tech, it backs founders solving critical societal, environmental and business problems. The firm claims an 80% graduation rate from seed to Series A among its portfolio. Investment LPs include endowments, foundations, family offices, pension and sovereign wealth funds, plus a strong base of European founders and operators.

Track record at scale

Across its first three fund vintages, the portfolio's aggregate post-money valuation stood at over €23 billion, and five unicorns joined the portfolio in 2021 alone — Forto, Infarm, Flink and SellerX among them. Flink, the instant-grocery startup, went on to raise $750 million at a $2.85 billion valuation in a round led by DoorDash. Cherry's founders have also put their money where their thesis is: the firm's LP base includes many of Europe's top founders and operators alongside institutional investors.

More recent additions reflect the newer themes: climate-tech names such as TWAICE, Carbo Culture and QOA, plus fresh faces on its current site like Robeauté, BUYCYCLE and The Exploration Company.

Notable portfolio

Cherry has written early cheques for some of Europe's best-known breakout companies:

  • AUTO1 Group — the online car marketplace, listed at a $2.2 billion valuation in 2021
  • FlixBus — the mobility platform
  • flaschenpost — the German delivery service
  • Forto — the logistics unicorn
  • Flink and SellerX — both reached €1 billion from seed in record time
  • Infarm and Cazoo — unicorn-era investments

Cherry does not run an accelerator programme or offer a standard perks bundle; its support model is hands-on, operator-style partnership with founders.

Why it matters for founders

Cherry is a natural first call for European founders at pre-seed or seed who want operators on their cap table — and its 60% follow-on reserve means a lead cheque from Cherry often comes with a deep-pocketed partner for your Series A and beyond.