Investor Profile: Hardware Club (HCVC) — Thesis, Cheque Size & How to Apply

Hardware Club funding comes from one of Europe's most distinctive deep-tech shops: HCVC, the Paris-based venture firm that grew out of a founder community for hardware startups. Founded in 2015 by Alexis Houssou (whose co-founder Barbara Belvisi later founded Interstellar Labs), the firm invests at pre-seed and seed across Europe and North America, writing initial cheques of €250k–€2.5M and targeting roughly 10 deals a year. It is emphatically still investing — it led Fuse Vectors' $5.2M pre-seed in February 2025 and participated in Rivercell's $25M seed announced on 7 October 2026.

The firm manages two funds: Fund I of $50M, launched in 2018 and backing 50 companies, and Fund II of $75M (€69M), closed in October 2023 and currently being deployed. The LP base for Fund II includes the European Investment Fund, Isomer Capital and Molten Ventures, alongside angel backers such as Albert Wenger of Union Square Ventures, John Elkann and Toto Wolff.

The Hardware Club (HCVC) investment thesis: industrialise scientific progress

The firm's own tagline says it plainly: "We back founders on a mission to industrialize scientific and technological progress." Houssou has framed the mission as backing founders who create "a future with more clean energy, more powerful computing, more context-aware robots, better defense tools for democracies and biomanufacturing that enables us to decarbonize food production." What began as a hardware-only fund has broadened into deep tech in full: climate and decarbonisation, computing and semiconductors, robotics, space, defense tech and biotech/biomanufacturing.

Sectors, stages and cheque size

HCVC invests at pre-seed and seed in Europe and North America, with initial cheques of €250k–€2.5M and follow-on capacity through the $75M second fund. It makes around 10 investments per year, which keeps the portfolio concentrated enough for the partners to stay close.

Notable portfolio

Earlier wins include connected e-bike maker Cowboy, grocery-tech startup Caper (acquired by Instacart) and agricultural AI company Augmenta (acquired by CNH Industrial). Recent HCVC-led rounds include Kyron.bio's $6M seed, Karman+'s $20M seed, Fuse Vectors' $5.2M pre-seed and Dyna Robotics — a run of hard-tech bets that underlines where Fund II capital is going.

Programs and perks

The "Hardware Club" name refers to a selective community of more than 600 hardware and deep-tech companies across roughly 50 countries, sharing knowledge, manufacturing and distribution resources — the community that the fund grew out of. Note the nuance: HCVC is not an investor in every community member; the community is a network and resource pool, not a deal pipeline. For founders, the practical perk is access to hard-won hardware and manufacturing know-how that generalist VCs rarely carry.

How to apply for funding

HCVC publishes no dedicated pitch-application portal; founders should reach out through the contact route on the official site at hcvc.co. Publicly named partners include founder and managing partner Alexis Houssou, Jerry Yang, Aymerik Renard and Alex Flamant, who joined as the firm raised Fund II.