Octopus Ventures formed in August 2007 when Octopus Group, the London holding company founded in 2000 by Simon Rogerson, Chris Hulatt, and Guy Myles, acquired Katalyst, a private investor group run by former City derivatives trader Alex Macpherson. That acquisition gave Octopus a genuine early-stage venture capability layered onto its broader financial services platform, and the firm has since grown into one of Europe's largest and most active VCs, investing from £1 million seed checks through £10 million-plus Series B rounds with the ability to fund companies all the way through IPO. Octopus organizes its investing around five specialist areas - health, fintech, deep tech, consumer, and B2B software - and has backed more than 380 companies since 2008, including Zoopla, SwiftKey, Graze.com, and Depop, which Etsy acquired for $1.6 billion in 2021.
Depop's $1.6 billion acquisition by Etsy in 2021 - an early Octopus Ventures backer of the fashion resale marketplace, alongside continued positions in Zoopla and SwiftKey