Yvonne Bajela closes $17 million Evertrue fund for early-stage AI and fintech

Yvonne Bajela’s Evertrue has closed an oversubscribed $17 million first fund, giving the investor an independent pool of capital for early-stage startups across the U.K. and Europe. Announced November 3, the fund will focus mainly on AI and fintech, with seven companies already backed and at least 20 investments planned over three years.

An AI catalyst for an independent fund

Bajela arrived at the decision after more than a decade in venture capital, most recently at LocalGlobe and Impact X Capital Partners. Speaking to TechCrunch, she described launching Evertrue as a way to act independently on her investment convictions and build a firm around her own approach to backing founders.

The AI boom helped determine the timing. In Bajela’s view, it has changed the economics of starting a company and opened opportunities for investors who back businesses early. She draws a distinction between making it easier to create a product and building a business that lasts: the first has become more accessible, while the second remains rare.

Her outlook also extends beyond familiar startup centers. Having worked across markets, including Japan as a senior investment manager, Bajela said she has seen how widely ambition and talent are distributed. She expects more globally significant businesses to emerge from a wider range of starting points.

Raising more, then drawing a line

Evertrue initially sought about $13 million. Investor interest took the final total above that target, but Bajela said she declined additional investors rather than keep increasing the fund’s size. Her stated priority was enough capital to build meaningful holdings in the investments she believed in most, without creating an obligation to put excess money to work.

That outcome did not make fundraising easy. Bajela described the process as a grind, with the hardest rejections coming after months of discussions rather than at the outset. Long conversations ending without a commitment had a real cost, she said, because they consumed time that a founder could not recover.

The fund secured five institutional backers, including the British Business Bank and Basecamp, Phoenix Court’s fund-of-funds. About 80% of its limited partners—the investors supplying the fund’s capital—are based in the U.K. The rest are spread across Europe, Asia and the U.S., reflecting relationships Bajela said she built over more than a decade.

Fund size is a strategic decision, not a measure of success in itself.

Yvonne Bajela, speaking to TechCrunch

The next investments will put the thesis to work

Bajela puts Evertrue’s planned average investment at around £350,000. Its geographic focus is the U.K. and Europe, but the portfolio already reaches beyond those markets: she said more than half of the companies it has backed operate in the U.S. She described that footprint as part of the fund’s global ambition.

Within AI and fintech, her selection criteria center on founders rather than a narrower product category. Bajela said she looks for an unusual insight into a problem, the ability to execute and an ambition extending well beyond the initial product. She also considers what founders have overcome and how those experiences have shaped their perspective.