Armilar announces first closing of fund IV with €120M to invest in disruptive technologies across Iberia and Europe

Lisbon, November 5th 2025 — Armilar, one of Southern Europe’s leading independent venture capital firms, announces the first closing of the fourth generation of its flagship funds, securing over €120 million to invest in disruptive technologies across Portugal, Spain and Europe.

The fund marks a significant milestone for Armilar and its ambition to support visionary founders. It builds upon Armilar’s strong track record and the success of its previous vehicles, underscoring Armilar’s ability to generate top-tier returns through early-stage technology investments.

Armilar IV has attracted a solid base of institutional investors, including the European Investment Fund (EIF) and the Sociedad Española para la Transformación Tecnológica (SETT) — with Spain’s NextTech vehicle for deep-tech innovation.

“Armilar IV marks a natural next step for our firm, the opportunity to extend our Series A investment platform and continue backing exceptional founders as they take their technologies from validation to scale,” said Pedro Ribeiro Santos, Managing Partner at Armilar. “We see outstanding innovation emerging from Iberia and across Europe and we want to help these companies grow globally.”

Duarte Mineiro, Partner at Armilar, explained: “Our aim is to build a portfolio of approximately 20 companies during the fund’s life. Iberia is a growing opportunity, as it combines world-class talent, growing R&D intensity and increasing institutional support. We’re incredibly grateful to the group of investors who share this understanding and are trusting us to pursue this opportunity on their behalf”.

This fund launch comes at a pivotal time for the European high-technology ecosystem, with Spain and Portugal showing strong momentum in venture investment and innovation activity. Armilar IV has a strong allocation to Iberia and a focus around Series A rounds. Its investment thesis is centered on the overlap between digital technologies and hard science, backing B2B startups with high technology content that solve world-class problems, in a broad range of industries and types of applications — from artificial intelligence to cybersecurity, from software development to infrastructure and computing, from digitalization to automation, from fintech to healthtech, to spacetech and dual-use technologies.

The firm reports a very active dealflow, reflecting the maturity and potential of Southern Europe’s founders and research-driven startups. The firm has already engaged with tens of highly-driven founding teams, and is currently analyzing several startups as part of its 2025 investment pipeline.

A Proven Track Record in Venture Capital

Founded over two decades ago, Armilar is recognized as one of Southern Europe’s most experienced venture capital firms, helping early-stage companies grow into global leaders such as OutSystems and Feedzai. Its strong track record of generating returns for investors is grounded on backing founders throughout their journey.

It was the firm’s hard-earned reputation, which also translated into the consistent production of strong returns to the investors in its prior flagship funds, that enabled the Armilar team to successfully raise Armilar IV amid what has been a very difficult period for raising Venture Capital funds.

Joaquim Sérvulo Rodrigues, Armilar’s founding Managing Partner, elaborates: “The shortage of liquidity of the last few years, with few IPOs and a depressed M&A activity, has translated into lower levels of investment in new VC funds — according to recent data, VC fundraising in 2025 could be the lowest we’ve seen for well over five years, particularly in Europe. We feel truly privileged to have closed a new fund at this moment, at a time where the abundance of new and exciting opportunities coincides with a reduction in new investment capacity”.

Armilar will continue raising for Armilar IV, aiming to double the fund’s size by the end of 2026.

About Armilar

Founded in 2000, Armilar Venture Partners is a Venture Capital firm based in Lisbon, Portugal, currently managing over € 600 million in assets, that has built a strong reputation by investing in groundbreaking companies with a strong technological differentiation, supporting them to become ‘global winners’ in their categories. With a high-performance track record and an international footprint, Armilar focuses on early-stage technology-based companies across Portugal, Spain, Europe and USA. To find out more and to register for news, please go to www.armilar.com