Yvonne Bajela closes $17M Evertrue Fund I to back UK AI startups

A UK founder raising a first cheque in AI or fintech has a new name to put on their list. Yvonne Bajela closed Evertrue Fund I at an oversubscribed $17 million, TechCrunch reported. The fund will back at least 20 companies over the next three years.

The fund and the manager

TechCrunch's Dominic-Madori Davis spoke with Bajela. Bajela was a VC for over a decade before starting Evertrue. She was most recently at LocalGlobe and before that at Impact X Capital Partners. She told TechCrunch she backed the fintech Wise, the insurance firm Marshmellow, and the robotaxi company Mooves while there. All three are now unicorns.

Bajela said she wanted the independence to act on her own convictions. She said the AI shift was the trigger. The ability to build a company has been democratised, she said. The ability to build something that lasts has not.

The cheques

The average cheque will be around £350,000, Bajela told TechCrunch. The focus is early-stage AI and fintech in the UK and Europe. Evertrue has already backed seven companies. More than half of the current portfolio operates in the US as well, she said.

The LPs

Evertrue has five institutional backers, Bajela told TechCrunch. Two were named: the British Business Bank and Basecamp. Basecamp is the fund-of-funds of Phoenix Court, the firm that also runs LocalGlobe. Evertrue was part of the British Business Bank's £400 million Investor Pathways programme. That programme put £90 million into ten first-time managers, Bajela told TechCrunch. About 80 percent of Evertrue's LPs are UK-based. The rest sit in Europe, Asia, and the US.

Bajela said she wanted to raise about $13 million. The fund was oversubscribed. She turned down more capital rather than grow the fund, she told TechCrunch. "Fund size is a strategic decision, not a measure of success in itself," she said.

The market

The UK is a hard market for first-time managers, TechCrunch wrote. Fundraising is called a barbell market in the US. Capital pools at the top with managers who already have a record. The UK has moved more. PitchBook data through the end of September showed that emerging UK fund managers raised $7.4 billion this year, TechCrunch reported. That is already past the $6.2 billion they raised in all of 2025.

What this means for a founder

Evertrue sits in the ground where many AI companies start. A seed cheque around £350,000, out of a $17 million fund, is a first-cheque size. That puts Bajela in reach for a UK or European AI founder's first round. Bajela told TechCrunch what she looks for. She named three things. A unique insight into a problem. An unusual ability to execute. The ambition to build something bigger than a first product. A founder preparing a first pitch now has one more named cheque in that range to approach. The British Business Bank's named role as an LP is the signal to watch here. It is public capital pulling into first-time managers who then back first-time founders.

Source

Yvonne Bajela is bringing $17M in fresh capital to Europe's startup scene, TechCrunch, by Dominic-Madori Davis.