Omnea announced the launch of the Omnea Future Founders Fund in partnership with European angel fund Firedrop.
The initiative will enable Omnea employees to pitch for seed funding to start their own businesses after five years at the company.
Employees will have the opportunity to pitch Omnea founder and CEO Ben Freeman and Firedrop founding partner Pietro Invernizzi for $250,000 in seed funding.
The process is designed to be simple, involving one 30-minute pitch meeting with immediate investment.
In addition to capital, successful employees will receive workspace, operational support, and hands-on coaching from Omnea’s CEO and executive team.
They will also gain access to Omnea and Firedrop’s network of operators, advisors, and investors.
The extended network includes entrepreneurs and operators such as Claire Hughes Johnson, former COO at Stripe; Anne Raimondi, COO at Asana; Joel Hellermark, founder and CEO of Sana Labs; and Harsh Sinha, CTO at Wise.
Omnea is an AI-native procurement orchestration platform used by fast-growing companies to manage purchasing workflows.
The company has grown to more than 200 employees across London and New York over the past four years.
Omnea said its hiring strategy has focused on entrepreneurial talent, noting that it interviewed more than 10,000 candidates for its first 50 roles.
More than 10% of Omnea employees have previously founded companies.
Those employees include Arie Barendrecht, founder and former CEO of WiredScore; Ben Champion, co-founder of Fygo; and Chris Mansfield, co-founder and CEO of GoodCourse.
Omnea has raised more than $75 million from investors including Accel, Entrepreneur First, First Round Capital, Insight Partners, Khosla Ventures, Point Nine, and Prosus.
Its customers include Spotify, McAfee, Synthesia, and other global companies.
Firedrop is a European angel fund led by Pietro Invernizzi and backed by more than 150 operators, unicorn founders, angel investors, and venture capitalists.
The fund invests between £100,000 and £350,000 in European and U.S. founders at the earliest stages.
KEY QUOTES:
“Joining a high-growth startup is often the ideal way to practice building one of your own. People who want to start their businesses in the future are looking for an environment that allows them to develop the skills they need and to provide a launchpad. Omnea does exactly this. And that is why we have the confidence to invest in any long-serving Omnean who chooses to go on that path.”
“When you build a team of ambitious, hard-working, and entrepreneurial people, some of them are inevitably going to want to start their own companies one day. I saw that first hand among my Tessian alumni-founder peers – including ElevenLabs’ Piotr Dabkowski, Maze’s Harry Wetherald, and Tracebit’s Andy Smith. If we can provide the structure, network and initial capital injection that will help these exceptional people get their businesses off the ground faster, that’s a great outcome.”
Ben Freeman, Founder and CEO of Omnea
“Omnea attracts and develops the kind of operators who become great founders: they work hard, care deeply, think outside the box, and make decisions with a longer time horizon. These are all qualities that early stage investors actively look for. We believe Omnea can be a launchpad for the next generation of ambitious founders, and we’re excited to partner to help make that happen.”
Pietro Invernizzi, Founding Partner at Firedrop
“The traits Omnea looks for in its employees are strikingly similar to the traits that make great founders. People who operate with rigour, urgency, and ownership develop an incredible foundation for entrepreneurship. While we expect most people to stay at Omnea for a long time given the trajectory the company is on, some will eventually decide to start companies of their own. Creating a pathway to support that makes a lot of sense.”
Sonali De Rycker, Partner at Accel and Board Member at Omnea
