Balderton Capital — portfolio autopsies

Zenjob raised over $100M to digitize temporary staffing in Germany — then discovered that flexible labor platforms live and die on the margin between worker pay and client billing

Microsoft acquired Sunrise for $100M for its beautiful calendar design — then shut Sunrise 12 months later and launched Outlook Mobile with the same features

Pre-owned luxury's poster child burned through $330M trying to authenticate and scale simultaneously.

The world's largest wine app — which couldn't turn 50 million users into profits

The e-commerce personalization leader — acquired before the category it built went mainstream.

The Barcelona election technology company raised €130M to digitize voting worldwide — then COVID-19 cancelled all elections globally in 2020 and the company filed bankruptcy.

$121M raised for real-time AI surveillance. CEO's KKK past destroyed it overnight.

Swedish indie-creator marketplace acquired by Shopify and shuttered a year later.

Germany's social gaming giant. Facebook platform changes ended it.

Errol Damelin built a £1B payday lender on 5,853% APR loans. FCA capped rates in 2015. Wonga wrote off £220M in unaffordable loans. Filed administration August 2018 after compensation claim surge.

Europe's Netflix before Netflix arrived — then Netflix arrived.

The teenage founder who gamified check-ins then abandoned them for mobile payments.

AOL paid $850M for Europe's biggest social network and drove it into the ground in two years.

The social network AOL paid $850M for — sold back to its founder for $1M five years later, after AOL did nothing with it while Facebook took all its users

The music streaming service with the best recommendation engine — acquired into extinction