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Ylan Steiner

Partner

London

Ylan is a highly regarded strategic advisor, acting across private equity investing and specialising in venture and growth capital transactions for both companies and investors, including a full range of related add on acquisitions and exits.

Ylan is recognised as a leading practitioner in both Chambers & Partners and Legal 500 UK.

Following an earlier career as a computer software programmer, Ylan has a passion for technology and innovation across numerous sectors.

Ylan’s notable company-side representations include Currencycloud, EVRYTHNG, Griffin Financial, MFS Africa, nPlan, Railsbank, Signal AI and Taster. One CEO client described Ylan as the “most incredible lawyer… [who I have worked with] for years. He's that good and his deal team is good too.”

In addition to his company-side representations, Ylan acts for leading venture capital and private equity firms and other strategic investors, including Vitruvian Partners, Warburg Pincus, Kennet Capital Partners, Kinnevik, Marlin Equity Partners, Seedcamp, and Oxx.

Ylan has been consistently recognised as a leading venture capital advisor in both Legal 500 and Chambers and Partners. Ylan was described by one client in Legal 500 UK 2022 as “an exceptionally knowledgeable counsel – he helped guide me through a number of challenges around our fundraise with ease, speed and clarity.”

A recent career highlight for Ylan was being invited by HM Treasury to advise on the UK Government’s Future Fund in response to calls from the technology industry to support VC backed start-ups throughout the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

  • Ylan serves as a regular speaker at seminars and conferences and a guest lecturer to the Masters Degree in Corporate Law (MCL) at the University of Cambridge, where he is a member of the MCL Practitioners Advisory Board and to the Masters of Law at London School of Economics. Ylan has presented on both the venture and buyout streams of the EVCA (European Private Equity and Venture Capital Association) Institute foundation course for investment professionals and a BVCA Venture Foundation course.

  • Venture and Growth Capital

    • DRUID AI, a global leader in conversational AI technology, on its $30m Series B financing round. 
    • Financings for a host of growth companies including Currencycloud (series A-E), Ebury, EVRYTHNG, Blippar (series A-E), Sefaira, RailsBank, MFS Africa, Taster and Signal AI.
    • Seed and Series A financings for some of the most promising UK tech and fintechs, including Outverse, Vita Yachts, Dala Technologies, Cuckoo Internet, Griffin Financial, nPlan, yHangry, Vatic Health, Oto Health, Proximity Insight, Tymit and Marcel for Art.
    • Company side growth financings for international scale-ups including Taster, MFS Africa and Signal AI.
    • Investor led growth financings for European and American investors including Kinnevik, Oxx, Marlin Equity Partners, Wavecrest, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, Kennet, Heartcore, Seedcamp and Ocado Ventures.
    • Vitruvian Partners on its participation in various Series A – G financing rounds, including those of Darktrace, Enfuce, Ebury Partners, FarFetch, Carwow, Smava, BitDefender, Gelesis, MPB, Logically, Just-Eat, TrustPilot and WalkMe, along with the subsequent sale or IPOs of many of these.
    • Warburg Pincus on its lead on a number of financings including those of Scandit, Privitar, Anemka Resources, Delonex Energy, Explora Petroleum, Fairfield Energy and Sand Hill Petroleum.
    • Kinnevik Online AB on the Series B financing of Monese, with participation from PayPal, Augmentum Fintech and IAG.
    • Railsbank, a Banking as a Platform (BaaP) on its Series Seed – B financings. The latest round brought the company's valuation to US$500 million.

    M&A and Private Equity

    • Currencycloud, developer of a foreign exchange payments automation platform, on its £700 million sale to Visa.
    • EVRYTHNG, developer of an end-to-end product cloud platform designed to help consumer product brands get real-time and actionable data to run their businesses efficiently, on its acquisition by NASDAQ listed Digimarc Corporation.
    • Kennet Partners on a range of investments and exits over the past 20 years, including those in Dext (formerly Receipt Bank), Rimilia, Nuxeo, WorldOne, Sequans, ChipIdea, Kapow, Clearswift and Cramer Systems.
    • Marlin Equity Partners on closing its acquisition of a minority interest in SmartCredit Limited (t/a “SmartSearch”).
    • Railsbank, a Banking as a Platform (BaaP), on its acquisition of Wirecard.
    • 3i Group plc on the sale of a significant part of its technology and healthcare portfolios, comprising over 30 companies in 10 jurisdictions, to a consortium comprising of Coller Capital, HarbourVest and DFJ Esprit.

    Other Corporate Transactions

    • Seedcamp, on its establishment, structure and numerous financings to date, together with the sell down of interests in Funds I and II to DFJ Esprit.
    • JC Flowers and its portfolio company OneSavings Bank on a range of transactions seeking to take advantage of the dislocation in the banking sector, and subsequent IPO of OSB, the first British bank to list in over a decade.

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