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U.K.-based limited partners Venrex<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Samos Investments<\/a> are this week backing the launch of a new VC primarily aimed at investing in startups led by Ukrainians inside and outside the war-torn country. The LPs are better known for being early institutional investors in the successful early stage startup funds Seedcamp and Entrepreneur First.<\/p>\n 1991 Ventures<\/a> is the brainchild of Ukrainian brothers Denis and Viktor Gursky, who are better known for running incubation and accelerator programs inside Ukraine.<\/p>\n The U.K.-based VC is launching with a \u00a315 million ($18.8 million) fund to invest in both Ukrainian and Central Eastern European (CEE) startup talent.<\/p>\n Although some might say investing in Ukrainian startups is crazy when the country is in the battle of its life against a brutal invasion by Russia, as we covered recently<\/a>, two years after the invasion, Ukrainian-born startups are still faring well.<\/p>\n The Gursky brothers previously backed more than 200 startups between 2016 and 2024, via their incubator Social Boost and their 1991 Accelerator<\/a>.<\/p>\n Many of those were out of their hometown of Mariupol, made famous after its heroic battle<\/a> against Russia and from where its team managed to relocate to safety. Startups backed to date include legal tech startup AXDRAFT, European toll payment app eTolls and cybersecurity company Osavul.<\/p>\n Over an interview Denis Gursky, founding partner of 1991 Ventures, told me: \u201cThere is a wealth of untapped talent in Ukraine and Central and Eastern Europe\u2026 My brother, Viktor, and I want to create a pipeline of high-quality dealflow to that.\u201d<\/p>\n He said the LP backers of the fund, \u201care very interested to tap into Eastern European and Ukrainian specifically.\u201d<\/p>\n Gursky also said: \u201cIt\u2019s very hard for Ukrainian founders to tap into London. So we would like to provide them with pre-seed or seed funding so that they can\u2026 access larger rounds in the future and understand how the U.K. can be a springboard to global funding.\u201d<\/p>\n But 1991 Venture won\u2019t be the only Ukrainian-born fund vying for the attention of their brethren founders.<\/p>\n There is also Ukrainian VC fund Roosh Ventures<\/a>, which has previously backed Reface AI, a face swap app with 250 million-plus downloads, and Deel, a payroll solution that enables companies to pay people in 150+ countries.<\/p>\n Additionally, SID Venture Partners<\/a> was launched by the co-founders of outsourcing companies Sigma Software and IdeaSoft and the Datrics product.<\/p>\n SMRK<\/a> \u2014 launched in 2013 by Oleksandr Kosovan, founder of MacPaw, and Andrii Dovzhenko \u2014 has invested in Osavul, Deus Robotics, Aspichi and Prengi.<\/p>\n Then there is Flyer One Ventures<\/a>, which has backed Vochi, Allset and PromoRepublic, among others.<\/p>\n Finally, TA Ventures<\/a> is perhaps the best known and most active Ukrainian VC internationally, headed up by the almost-ubiquitous Viktoriya Tigipko<\/a>.<\/p>\n It has invested in more than 200 startups, including 15 Ukrainian ones, and made 42 exits, according to Crunchbase.<\/p>\n Many of the tech companies Ukraine will produce in the forthcoming years are likely to be either \u201cdual-use\u201d or related to defense. For instance, almost 200 companies produced drones in Ukraine last year, up from seven in 2022<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n