K Fund

K Fund Research

Investment Thesis

K Fund (also styled Kfund) is a Madrid-based, multi-stage venture capital firm founded in 2016 by Iñaki Arrola, Carina Szpilka, and Pablo Ventura. The firm backs technology-based, differentiated products and services with a self-described appetite for "the crazy, contrarians, outliers." K Fund started as a seed-only fund focused on Spain, investing between €500k and €2m, and has since evolved into an international, multi-product family of funds spanning pre-seed through Series B. The firm explicitly frames itself as founder-friendly, using simple, easy-to-understand terms, and positions itself as a value-added partner rather than a passive check-writer, leaning on its own team of serial founders (marketplaces, B2B SaaS) and operators.

Sector Focus

K Fund is sector-agnostic by design, aiming for a diversified portfolio across verticals and geographies. In practice, the portfolio skews heavily toward enterprise/B2B software (Abacum, Digibee, Skillvue), fintech and payments (Remuner, Teal, Lend, Bcome), HR/work tech (Factorial, Hireflix, Fetcher), healthcare and healthtech/medtech (Tucuvi, Livo, Sofiasalud, Promptly Health, Base4 Bio), insurance-tech (Bliss, Barkibu), travel and hospitality (Exoticca, Amenitiz), proptech/real estate investment (Urbanitae, Crescenta), legaltech (Cicerai), and a growing bet on robotics and physical AI (Theker Robotics). The firm has published a dedicated healthcare investment thesis emphasizing the intersection of healthtech and medtech, and a robotics thesis ("Where AI meets steel") arguing robotics is entering a new capability curve driven by foundation models. AI/ML and applied LLM tooling now run through the large majority of new investments (HappyRobot, Mito, Causa Prima, Alinia, Genesy, Numbi, Traza).

Stage Focus

K Fund now spans four stages through a "multi-product family of funds":

• Pre-seed: A fully dedicated pre-seed program (led day-to-day by Marc Clemente and Isabel) writing first institutional checks, typically co-investing rather than leading, alongside tier-one leads (a16z, Speedinvest, Notion Capital, Precursor, Pear VC, Creandum have all co-invested alongside K Fund at this stage).
• Seed: The firm's original stage since 2016, historically €500k-€2m checks; roughly 60 seed investments across the first two seed funds.
• Series A/B ("Leadwind"): A dedicated $250m vehicle for Series A/B rounds with check sizes of €3m-€10m, reflecting the firm's evolution from purely early-stage to a partner across a company's growth trajectory.
• Overall, K Fund advertises investing from pre-seed to Series B, with tickets from €100k to €15m depending on stage and fund.

Check Size

• Pre-seed: €100k-€350k (co-investment tickets)
• Seed: €500k-€2m (historical core range)
• Series A/B (Leadwind): €3m-€10m
• Firm-wide range advertised on the homepage and across press coverage: €100k to €10m-€15m

Lead Tendency

Mixed/both. At pre-seed, K Fund explicitly states it typically will not lead given its €100-350k ticket size relative to €1-1.5m average pre-seed rounds, preferring to co-invest behind a top-tier lead. At seed and Series A, K Fund has led or co-led rounds directly — for example co-leading Bliss's ~$11m Series A alongside Bradesco Asset Management (March 2026). The firm participates as a syndicate member in many larger rounds (e.g., HappyRobot's $150m Series C, Causa Prima's $10m pre-seed led by Creandum).

Recent Activity

K Fund has been highly active through 2025-2026, with roughly 23 new investments in the trailing 12 months as of mid-2026 (per third-party trackers) and 106+ cumulative portfolio companies. Notable recent moves:

• August 2026: Participated in HappyRobot's $150m Series C at a $1.2b post-money valuation (led by Prysm Capital, co-led by Eurazeo), taking the agentic-AI-for-enterprise-operations company to unicorn status.
• June 2026: Participated in Causa Prima's $10m pre-seed (led by Creandum) for an agent-to-agent B2B payments network.
• March 2026: Co-led Bliss's ~€9.5m-$11m Series A (with Bradesco Asset Management) to build AI infrastructure for insurance distribution in Brazil.
• 2025-2026: New investments in Tucuvi (Series A, AI voice care management), MITO AI (pre-seed, collaborative AI video creation), Theker Robotics, Traza, Numbi, Quiver AI, Latitude, Lightbase, Mafer, Emblematic, and others.
• Team growth: welcomed Felipe Talavera (March 2026) and Ricardo Palacios (July 2026) to the firm. K Fund is actively raising and deploying multiple concurrent vehicles (a €70m sixth fund, "K3," closed June 2024, plus the pre-seed program and the $250m Leadwind Series A/B fund), and is best characterized as actively deploying.

Portfolio Highlights

With more than 100 portfolio companies, notable names include:

• Factorial — HR/payroll SaaS, one of Spain's best-known unicorns, in K Fund's portfolio since 2018.
• Exoticca — curated travel marketplace, portfolio since 2018.
• HappyRobot — agentic AI for enterprise operations; reached unicorn status ($1.2b) in August 2026.
• Voicemod — real-time voice-changing software with a large consumer user base.
• TL;DV — AI meeting-notes/recording tool with broad international adoption.
• Urbanitae — real estate crowdfunding/investment platform.
• Exits/M&A within the portfolio: Frontity (acquired by Automattic), Wide Eyes (acquired by Stylitics), Arengu (acquired by Okta), Billin (acquired by TeamSystem), Hubtype (acquired by Aries Global), Kosmo (renamed/relaunched as Nash), Lucera (acquired by MásMóvil).
• A "We Tried" list on the firm's own site (Bob, Boopos, Ferly, Goin, Nuna, Rice, Tacter, and others) reflects failed or discontinued positions the firm transparently discloses — a notable piece of firm culture/branding.

Team

• Iñaki Arrola — Founding Partner. Founded coches.com (sold to Santander Consumer Finance, 2019); co-founded pre-seed vehicle Vitamina K (CARTO, Mailtrack, Promofarma).
• Carina Szpilka — Partner. Career at Banco Santander, Argentaria, and ING Direct, including CEO of ING Direct France and later ING Direct Spain (2010-2014).
• Pablo Ventura — Partner. Previously Partner/Managing Director at JME Venture Capital and FJME (Jobandtalent, Flywire); joined K Fund pre-first-investment.
• Sergio Álvarez Leiva — Partner. Co-founded three data-space companies (Vizzuality, CARTO, Tinybird) before turning investor.
• Jaime Novoa — Partner. Former journalist; runs the widely read Dealflow.es newsletter (10k+ subscribers) on the Spanish startup ecosystem.
• Marc Clemente — Leads the pre-seed investment program; previously an analyst at BlueBull Ventures.
• María de Lera Auersperg — Investor. Prior tech banking at Credit Suisse, operating roles at Lyft, and investing at Mosaic Ventures and Felix Capital.
• Gustavo Ribas — Leads K Fund's Latam presence. Former CIO/partner at RXZ Investimentos; founder of VC firms Provence Capital and Mogno Capital.
• Borja Santos — Operating Partner focus on GTM. Launched and led Stripe in Spain and Portugal for 6+ years.
• César Traseira — Investor, background spanning medicine, business, and international relations.
• Cristina Garcia-Margallo — Head of Legal and Finance.
• Felipe Talavera and Ricardo Palacios — Recent 2026 additions to the team.

Decision Process

K Fund operates as a partnership with a broad, specialized investment team (dedicated pre-seed, growth/Leadwind, and Latam leads), rather than a solo-GP structure or formal investment committee model described publicly. Sector and stage specialists (e.g., Marc Clemente for pre-seed, Gustavo Ribas for Latam) drive sourcing and diligence within their remit.

Founder Preferences

K Fund's pre-seed thesis is explicit: it prioritizes second-time founders, experienced operators, and "high performing founders that have a unique and unfair advantage, network and insights into the specific problem they are solving." The firm favors technical/domain-expert founders tackling large, underserved markets (e.g., Lend's Stanford MBA founders addressing a $54b Brazilian credit problem; Alinia's AI-governance specialists; MITO's production-industry veterans).

Geographic Focus

Originally Spain-only, K Fund has expanded to "Southern Europe and Latin America" as its core geography (per its own tagline "From Southern Europe to the world"), with a dedicated Latam lead (Gustavo Ribas) and portfolio companies across Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Brazil, while also co-investing in international deals sourced through its pre-seed program (Brazil, US, UK).