Longtime Atomico partner Irina Haivas has departed the VC after more than six years, following a period of people changes at the top of the firm and a record fundraise.
Since joining Atomico as principal in August 2018, Haivas had been focused on investments in AI, health and biotech, software and deeptech. She’d been involved in deals for Daniel Ek’s body scanning startup Neko Health — which raised $260m in January — breast cancer screening company Kheiron Medical and techbio platform Healx.
Haivas departed the firm this month, less than a year after it raised $1.24bn to back European startups from Series A and beyond — its biggest fund to date and one of the largest funds ever for a VC focused solely on Europe.
“I am incredibly grateful to Atomico and [founder] Niklas Zennström for my time there, and for amazing colleagues and founders I have had the privilege to work with,” Haivas told Sifted.
“My passions remain rooted in deeply disruptive technologies, the people who drive them and the opportunity to create meaningful impact at scale — especially in Europe.”
Haivas declined to comment on what her next steps were.
In September last year, Sifted reported that since Atomico’s fifth fund of $820m, which it raised in 2020, five partners had left and seven had joined.
Atomico said that its latest funds — a $485m early-stage fund and a $754m growth fund — would be deployed across various verticals.
The VC has already backed more than 20 companies across the two vehicles, including AI translation startup DeepL, Zurich-based AI startup Lakera, UK virtual clinic provider Pelago and German IT management platform Deeploi.
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