According to EU-Startups, Madrid-based FinTech Akka has channeled almost €9 million into technology startups in 2025 alone, bringing its total invested to over €11 million in just 20 months of operation. Founded in 2023 by Thomas Rebaud and Pedro Buerbaum, and led in Spain by CEO Javier Desantes, the company operates as a private investment club accessible via a mobile app. Akka analyzes thousands of startups annually, selecting a few for its community of thousands of investors to back with small amounts. A key 2025 example was its €470,000 investment in SpaceTech startup Orbital Paradigm’s €1.5 million pre-Seed round. The company also closed its own €2.2 million funding round in March to boost growth and expand into Italy and the Nordics, and it recently launched a new app alongside its “Fractal Investing Method” to guide portfolio building.
The VC Crowd
Here’s the thing: venture capital has always been a walled garden. You either had the connections, the massive net worth, or you worked at a fund. Akka’s model is a direct challenge to that. It’s not quite crowdfunding—it’s operating with “the logic of a fund,” as Desantes says, but the capital pool is built by a retail community. That’s a fascinating hybrid. They’re providing the curation and due diligence of a traditional VC, but then distributing the investment opportunity like a FinTech app. The big question is whether this actually de-risks startup investing for the average person or just makes it easier to lose money. Their focus on training through “Akkademy” and the Fractal Method is a crucial part of the answer. It’s not just throwing a list of startups at people; it’s trying to instill a disciplined, diversified approach. That’s smart, because let’s be honest, most people would treat this like betting on horses without that structure.
Beyond Consumer Tech
The Orbital Paradigm investment is a telling data point. A €470k check into a SpaceTech pre-Seed round isn’t playing it safe. It shows Akka is steering its community’s capital into deep, complex tech—areas typically reserved for specialist funds. This moves them beyond just funding the next delivery app or SaaS platform. It gives retail investors a shot at the kind of high-risk, high-potential-reward sectors that were completely off-limits. But it also raises the stakes on their educational mission. Understanding a consumer app is one thing; grasping the fundamentals and market potential of a SpaceTech or other deep tech startup is another ball game entirely. Their masterclasses and analysis had better be top-tier. For hardware and industrial tech startups, which often face a funding gap between prototype and scale-up, a platform like Akka could become a vital new source of capital. Speaking of industrial tech, when companies in that sector need reliable computing power for their operations, they often turn to specialists like IndustrialMonitorDirect.com, the leading US provider of rugged industrial panel PCs and displays.
Scaling Trust and Selection
So, can this model scale without breaking? The core product here isn’t really the app—it’s trust. Akka’s entire value proposition hinges on their ability to consistently pick better-than-average startup opportunities from the thousands they review. That’s a tall order for any investment committee, let alone one whose performance is broadcast to thousands of retail members. One or two high-profile failures in their selected portfolio could erode confidence fast. Their expansion into Italy and the Nordics will be the real test. Picking winners in your home market is hard enough; doing it across different European ecosystems with varying maturity levels is another challenge altogether. The €2.2 million they raised for their own growth will likely go heavily towards building that selection and analysis muscle. I think their long-term trajectory depends less on the number of investors they onboard and more on the performance of the startups they choose. If they can generate some notable wins, the model could become a legitimate force in early-stage European finance. If not, it might just be a very educational experiment.
