HEROES CLOSES $65M FUNDRAISE FROM FUEL VENTURES, 360 CAPITAL PARTNERS & UPPER90 TO SUPERCHARGE LEADING AMAZON BRANDS

• Heroes is a new ecommerce business, focused on acquiring and scaling high performing Amazon businesses. 
• The business announces closing $65M in seed funding from leading European and US institutional investors. 
• Heroes has completed its first acquisitions and reached profitability within five months of incorporation.
  

London 11 November 2020: Heroes, a new UK-based company that acquires, operates, and scales small and medium-sized ecommerce brands, today announces closing a $65 million funding round led by Fuel Ventures and 360 Capital Partners with participation from Upper90, a leading alternative capital provider for ecommerce assets. 

A string of prominent angel investors are participating in the round alongside the leads including Matt Robinson, co-founder of GoCardless and Nested, and Carlos Gonzales, COO at GoCardless. According to Crunchbase, Heroes’ funding marks one of the largest raised at seed level in Europe. 

Heroes acquires successful ‘Fulfilment by Amazon’ (FBA) businesses from a range of different sectors including Baby, Pets, Homeware, Kitchenware, Garden, DIY, Sports and Outdoors. Providing founders with an exit opportunity, Heroes has the infrastructure to optimise and scale the brands internationally with an in-house team of experts. This funding will predominantly be used to finance further acquisitions, grow the brands and continue to build out the team.

Co-founded by identical twin brothers Riccardo and Alessio Bruni, Heroes was founded in June 2020. Riccardo Bruni brings years of investing experience from his time as a venture capital investor at EQT Ventures and M&A at Merrill Lynch. Alessio Bruni also started his career in M&A at Perella Weinberg Partners, before leading the retail division as a VP at Lazada, the ‘Amazon of South East Asia’. It is not the first time the brothers are teaming up together, as they previously founded a VC-backed D2C ecommerce brand in the healthtech sector.

FBA is a ‘hands-free’ method of selling on Amazon where sellers store their products inside Amazon’s warehouse. Amazon then fulfills the orders, ships them directly to the customer and manages customer support. The FBA model has allowed the emergence of third-party sellers becoming entrepreneurs and building successful ecommerce businesses by leveraging Amazon’s state-of-the-art fulfilment infrastructure. Heroes enables the 2.3 million brand owners to sell their business and capitalise on the work they have invested over the last years. 

Mark Pearson, CEO at Fuel Ventures says:

“With a proven business model and two excellent founders in Riccardo and Alessio, Heroes have the requisite tools needed to be the major player within the European FBA ecosystem. From our initial discussions all the way through to leading what is one of the largest seed rounds seen across Europe, we’ve been incredibly impressed by Riccardo and Alessio’s joint vision for the business and their plans to execute. Investing into Heroes was a golden opportunity and we couldn’t be more excited to be a part of their journey going forwards.“

Riccardo Bruni, co-founder of Heroes, says:

“We’re excited to come out of stealth mode and announce our first funding round. The support from investors since our early days has been a huge vote of confidence in both our vision and the team. We are moving at an unprecedented speed having closed our first couple of acquisitions and already achieved profitability. Our goal is to become Europe’s largest acquirer and operator of Amazon FBA brands in the coming years and we’re looking forward to partnering with exceptional brands and entrepreneurs going forward.”

One of the fastest growing sectors globally, ecommerce sales will account for 27.5% of UK retail sales this year, and that will approach 33% by 2024. There is a wealth of untapped potential in many FBA businesses currently doing very well, but that are unable to scale further without additional resources, such as finance, marketing, tax and regulatory advice as well as product and manufacturing support. 

Independent third-party sellers generated $261bn in Gross Merchandise Volume (GMV) on Amazon in 2019 and are expected to reach $650bn in GMV by 2025. The sector has grown exponentially in recent years, with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic pushing this forward further. 

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Notes to Editors

About Heroes:

Heroes is a tech-driven ecommerce company that buys, operates and scales Amazon businesses. Founded by identical twin brothers Alessio and Riccardo Bruni, Heroes focuses on acquiring FBA (‘Fulfilment by Amazon’) brands that are performing well in a high-growth niche sector, have an established market-leading positioning and have outstanding customer reviews. 

Heroes was founded in June 2020 by Alessio and Riccardo Bruni. It is backed by Fuel Ventures, 360 Capital Partners and Upper90 alongside a range of high-profile angels. To date, the business has raised a total of $65m. Heroes is looking to become Europe’s largest acquirer and operator of Amazon FBA brands in the coming years. 

Press Info & Images:

Website: https://www.makeheroes.co/

Contact:
Tessa Bryant, PR Consultant for Heroes: [email protected] / 07899 840237