Everything here is led by Founders, for Founders. We believe capital is a commodity, experience and inner purpose are not. We want to help our Founders succeed in building extraordinary companies. We’re an experienced team of operators who have started dozens of companies by shaping people's lives. We are on our journey to create a better society by creating impactful companies.

Our new step as former entrepreneurs and business angels. We have been working in the startup industry for more than 20 years, launching our own companies, mentoring some of the most successful tech startups and investing as business angels in more than 150 projects. Thus we have decided to go a step further and launch Encomenda Smart Capital: a fund where we keep investing in seed digital companies with further resources and money but the same philosophy that we had as business angels. We help entrepreneurs for free in making strategic decisions, scaling organizations, implementing financial planning, defining new business opportunities, seeking new talent, analyzing their main KPIs and preparing their companies for next funding rounds. Our initial investment ranges from 100K€ to 350K€, and we can invest up to 1,8M€ per company.

We invest in entrepreneurial teams seeking to transform big ideas into game-changing companies. We invest in tech-enabled early and seed stage startups operating primarily in the MENA but also abroad. Why Averroes? Because we don't only invest money, we invest time, which is ultimately more valuable than money. While startups spend their time building their product and strategy, we come along the way and help support them by exposing them to our vast network of connections to help materialize a strategic foundation. We understand our region's ins and outs and we have the necessary connections that pave the way for our startups and accelerate their traction and development. Our team possesses over 150 years of combined experience in global business operation and management across a multitude of sectors to help achieve any and all of your visions.

We are a sector agnostic early-stage investor that wants to partner with founders from the very beginning of their journey and support them throughout their growth. Our team has global experience in building and scaling companies both as founders and in various CxO roles. We invest in ambitious and determined teams that can one day become industry leaders.

Transform your innovations into market-ready solutions. Our comprehensive acceleration programs, funding support, and startup studio services help entrepreneurs build sustainable businesses.

Since its founding in 2009, H/L Ventures has forged a new way to build companies. H/L Ventures’ unique approach combines Daily Active Engagement with every portfolio company and a focus on investing in growth, impact, and diversity. Today, H/L Ventures manages a family of companies and funds that together comprise a holistic company-building ecosystem. At the heart of this system is H/L Studio, which was among the first venture studios to include social impact in its investment thesis. That venture studio is now supported by our opportunity fund, CityRock Ventures, and our managed services group, H/L Strategies, among other entities. Our team has pioneered an innovative, effective model that aligns the interests of entrepreneurs, investors, other stakeholders, and society to succeed together. At H/L Ventures, we apply these three key elements across our studios and funds: DAILY ACTIVE ENGAGEMENT WITH FOUNDERS H/L Ventures’ involvement with our portfolio companies is as hands-on and supportive as possible throughout the entrepreneurship journey. This is the hallmark of H/L’s approach: we hold ourselves to a standard of virtually daily contact with every company in our portfolio, on an open-ended basis. This is not the empty promise of a website value-added page, but the core of our investment thesis. We host weekly calls with our senior portfolio team and each team of founders, which leads to daily activities involving our staff, Venture Partners, EPIRs, advisors, and network of service providers. All of this is in a supportive mode, meant to ensure that whatever needs our portfolio companies have, we remain actively relevant and helpful, every day. This care is given to all portfolio companies, regardless of which H/L Ventures vehicle is engaged. A POWERFUL ECOSYSTEM We respond effectively and proactively to our portfolio companies via a powerful team and community. Organized in a hub-and-spoke model around our core portfolio staff, four key communities help us co-build companies: Venture Partners & EPIRs, Advisors, Member Partners, and our affiliated Trusted Partner Network. Our team is shared across all our family of studios and funds. ACCESS TO CAPITAL From inception to exit, we provide many different forms of capital. Pre-Series A start-ups benefit from the H/L Studio model, where they enjoy access to virtually every form of capital, including human capital, social capital, networks, experience, and time. H/L does not normally invest in Pre-Seed rounds, focusing on our broad range of value-add services as we build a deeper relationship together via our Studio. We do however offer $100,000 in funding at the formal Seed round stage for our Studio companies [1, see Footnote], as well as an opportunity to leverage our extensive networks of co-investors to benefit the team’s fundraising efforts. Our opportunity fund, CityRock Venture Partners, invests at Series A and Series B. CityRock funds both qualifying studio portfolio startups and companies that come to us from outside of the studio pipeline, provided they fit our thesis and pass our standard due diligence process. Regardless of placement in the H/L Ventures ecosystem, all of our portfolio companies enjoy full access to our venture studio resources.