A CB Insights report has examined the top 25 Italy venture investors. The team at CB Insights said that to prepare the report, they have extensively used their so-called predictive signals in order to identify Italy’s major venture firms and then ranked them based primarily on their portfolio strength and ability to reliably predict future winners.
CB Insights also mentioned that more than 1,000 Italy investors backed equity deals this year so far, creating “a competitive landscape where strategic positioning is crucial.”
To differentiate themselves, top companies such as CDP Venture Capital are now said to be aggressively pursuing deals in high-growth areas “such as AI, digital health, and space tech, positioning them to capture outsized returns.”
Using CB Insights’ Mosaic score and deal data, the researchers said that they have analyzed which investors are “building the strongest foundations for portfolio success.”
CB Insights has named their picks for what they consider to be the top 25 venture investors in Italy, and key takeaways on the list have been shared.
Key takeaways noted by the team at CB Insights:
- CDP Venture Capital leads our ranking with 139 startup deals since 2023 (as of 9/30/2025). Of those, nearly one-fifth went to AI companies — including AI model compressor Multiverse Computing and processing unit developer Axelera AI.
- Neva SGR leads in terms of the quality of its recent investments. Its investments since 2023 have a higher average Mosaic score (751 out of 1,000) than any other investor on the list. Top performers in its portfolio include quantum computing software developer Classiq (884; also backed by Samsung NEXT and Qualcomm Ventures) and fusion energy company Commonwealth Fusion Systems (869; scored a strategic partnership with Google earlier this year).
- CDP Venture Capital also shows the best exit track record, backing 13 startups since 2018 that went on to exit. The biggest exit of the fund was that of IoT security platform Nozomi Networks (acquired by Mitsubishi Electric for $1B).
The research team said that they have used CB Insights data to review the dealmaking activity of hundreds of Italy investors “that fund private-market startups in exchange for equity, and rank them based on the strength and performance of their portfolios.”
Their scoring model factors in deal volume between “Q1’23 and Q3’25 and the share of portfolio companies invested in since 2018 that have gone on to exit.”
As clarified in the update, they have decided to exclude government vehicles, startup accelerators, incubators.
