Marie Ekeland

Tomorrow I’m lucky to be hosting a panel with three exceptional founders: - Gilles Gaillard - Co-founder of Animaj, raised 100m EUR (in equity and debt) in 2023 to build an AI-powered animation studio that counts 𝗮 stunning 15 billion (!) YouTube views per year. Animaj acquires animation and cartoon franchises to turn them into digital-first content and amplifies their distribution using AI. - Baptiste Jamin - Co-founder of Crisp IM, 42 alumni, also can be called the “King of Bootstrap”. He started building chatbots in 2015, 𝗯𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗶𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗰𝗼𝗼𝗹. Crisp centralises all customer interactions through live chat, chatbots, and a shared inbox. Today Crisp serves over 600,000 companies without raising any funds. - Vincent SIMON - Co-founder of Relationchips and founder of Simundia. Vincent is a serial entrepreneur & investor who founded a coaching platform that raised over 15m EUR & is currently working on a no-code sales workflow platform. What do they have in common? They started their career as freelancers and worked their way up to become highly successful entrepreneurs. 👉 Join us at Le Wagon tomorrow at 7pm to hear their story. We’ll also host a networking session for you to meet people from our community who are working on projects that might interest you. 🔗Link to register in the comments.

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🚀 How’s French Tech Doing in 2024? | Insights from the latest France Digitale x EY Barometer Reposted from: Joseph Landauer On September 11, 2024, France Digitale and EY released their annual report, and despite the tough economic climate, there’s plenty to be proud of! French startups are proving they’re ready to face the challenges head-on. Here are five key takeaways: 1️⃣ 15,000 startups are thriving in France, with 3,500 new ones launched in just the past year! So, who said French Tech was slowing down? 2️⃣ 1.3 million jobs created by these startups. Yes, you read that right. While hiring may slow down in 2024, we’re still pushing forward 💪. 3️⃣ Funding crunch: Big deals are happening, but smaller rounds are struggling. VCs are searching for ways to keep the ecosystem thriving. 4️⃣ Global reach: French startups are expanding fast, with 27% revenue growth internationally. Europe is our playground 🌍. 5️⃣ AI dominance: Whether it’s internal tools or product offerings, AI is everywhere. But competition with global giants is fierce 🤖. So, what’s next? French Tech is holding strong, but continued support from policymakers is crucial for future success. Innovation, taxation, and European regulations will be pivotal in the coming years. A big thank you to France Digitale and EY for this report! 🙏 Looking forward to seeing many of you at #FDDAY on September 18. Let’s keep pushing boundaries! 🙌 #FrenchTech #Innovation #Startups

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Time to step up Germany 🇩🇪 🇫🇷 Corporations have pledged to invest €15bn in France at the “Choose France” summit — an annual event held since 2018 to facilitate foreign investments in the country. A large chunk of the money will be dedicated to AI. Microsoft stole the show after announcing its largest investment in France to date, a €4bn cash envelope to build more data centres — and expand existing ones — across the country by the end of 2025. The focus is on increasing the capacity of GPUs, which are needed to run large AI models. Amazon also announced that it’ll invest €1.2bn to further develop its French cloud and AI infrastructure. Quantum computing was also on the agenda. IBM pledged to invest €45m to expand the company’s research efforts in France. Up to 50 quantum researchers and engineers will be recruited in the country in the next year.

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Soooo pretty much how French VC has always been. VC firms suing each other. LPs firing GPs. LPs taking funds back. VCs suing entrepreneurs. It's always been a dramatic scene. 🇫🇷 🐓🍷🥖 https://lnkd.in/eK8JbgDA #vc #venrurecapital #startups #entrepreneurs #entrepreneurship #tech #technology #innovation #money #business

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Together with our CTO, Antoine Latrille, I'm delighted to share the study on AI adoption that we conducted across 80 of our startups in France and in the USA. Here is a preview of the key insights: 1) IA integration is about wining the race of productivity => 70% of companies have implemented IA and 67% reported productivity gains. Motivation is not only internal as 1 over 4 startup fear competitor could outpace them. 2) Internal knowledge is preferred as outsourcing => for 90% startups as they want to ensure they can swiftly adapt to AI advancements and maintain control over their innovations 3) US ecosystem is more favorable but both French and American startups share desire to integrate AI => 10 out 12 AI tools are coming from the US with a more favorable regulation and bigger AI investments ($67b against $2b in France in 2023). However 95% of French startups have or want to integrate IA and 1 over 5 have participated in our IA Booster program. Initiated in December, Newfund IA Booster was meant to support startups learn from real-life AI applications, promoting an in-house approach to innovation. At Newfund, we're committed in bridging cross-Atlantic differences and supporting our startups in harnessing the full potential of AI to outpace global competition. To read more about the study: https://lnkd.in/eArUP4uR #AI #Startups #Newfund #USA #France #Innovation

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A must read for every founder (and investor) in B2B marketplaces. ⤵️ All credits to Fabrice Grinda + FJ Labs 👏🏽 https://lnkd.in/eB7uGzyH #firstdegree #founders #investors #whyrelationshipsmatter
#alwaysbelearning #sharingknowledge

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I’m pleased to have contributed to Arianee’s position paper, "From A Production-Based to A Service-Based Economy: The Role of Tokenization in Decoupling Growth." This insightful paper tackles a topic close to my heart. This paper outlines numerous practical strategies for companies to progress on tackling overproduction while creating new economic opportunities. Thank you Arianee, Pierre-Nicolas Hurstel and of course my friend Francois Souchet for the opportunity to collaborate. #circulareconomy #technology #circularbusinessmodels #sustainability

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🚀 For the last 6 months, we've been working on a new programme to accelerate VCs raising their next fund... 🎙️ I am delighted to announce we are now live! Applications are now open to participate in the first programme for emerging VC managers based in Europe, providing fundraising workshops from fundraising experts, LP connections and world-class mentoring. We kick off the first cohort of 15 - 20 VCs in Q1 2025. 🧐 Fundraising is hard. Hard for founders. Even harder for VCs. There is a vacuum of fundraising support for funds, and there's never been a more difficult time to get one off the ground... So what do participating funds receive? 1️⃣ Warm introductions to Limited Partners and Family Offices 2️⃣ Fundraising templates 3️⃣ 10+ hours of world-class mentoring 4️⃣ Content delivered through workshops with a focus on fundraising 5️⃣ Strong peer community 6️⃣ Opportunity of an LP commit from our network Who are the mentors? 👥 VC mentors include founding partners from some of the most successful VCs in Europe such as LocalGlobe, Dawn Capital, Hoxton Ventures, Partech, Heartcore, Speedinvest, and many more. Collectively, they have raised over $11bn across 80 funds 🤯 👥 LP mentors include investors from some of the most active Limited Partners such as the BBB, KfW, Isomer and many more. Who is the programme for? 🚀 Emerging VCs (broadly those raising Funds I - III) based in Europe 💰 We expect applicants to already be exceptional investors, we will focus on making them exceptional fundraisers. How much does it cost? 💰 👉 It's completely free! With no hidden costs. We want to avoid selection bias and level the playing field for under-represented managers What is the time commitment? ⏲️ 👉 Designed to fit a General Partner's busy schedule, participants will attend at least 3 LP networking events, 6 days of high-impact workshops over a 3-month period and receive 10 hours of mentoring. How to apply? 🎯 👉 You can learn more & apply directly from our website 👉 All those applying will receive access to LP investor lists, fundraising templates and exclusive benefits from our partners. How will we select the funds? ⚖️ With the help of Blue Future Partners, our fund selection partner, we will select VCs with a differentiated strategy, a partner team with deep domain experience, and those that we believe will most likely become the next generation of top-tier funds. 🎗️ I researched and dilligenced all the VC service providers I was recommended, to select partners with a track record of supporting the Emerging Manager community. This programme would not have been possible without the support of: HFL as our fund admin partner 📕 Osborne Clarke as our legal partner 📃 Sage as our technology partner 🧑‍💻 Ballou as our PR partner 🎤 Leela Capital Regulatory Solutions as our regulatory partner 𝍍 Johnston Carmichael Chartered Accountants and Business Advisers as our accounting partner 🧾

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💥 Linkup annonces a 3M€ funding round to plug LLMs to high-quality content.    Much like the music industry before Spotify, AI applications today face hurdles in accessing quality content. In the early 2000s, people often turned to platforms like Pirate Bay to download music, but that came with legal risks, poor sound quality, and artists missing out on fair compensation. Similarly, today many AI tools depend on existing web frameworks like search engines and web scraping to collect information.   However, as the AI landscape evolves, these methods are proving less efficient and raising new concerns around legal compliance and fair use of copyrighted content.   Linkup aims to solve this problem by taking a new approach with premium content providers with both a legal and ethical consideration.   Delighted to support this top-notch team Philippe Mizrahi, Denis Charrier, Boris Toledano alongside Seedcamp, Motier Ventures, Kima Ventures OPRTRS CLUB and amazing BAs ! cc Sia Houchangnia, Nicolas Essayan, Christophe Raynaud, Noé Gersanois, Chloe Timsit, Alix François-Poncet, Axeleo Capital (AXC)

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🤨 What do I look for in co-founders ? 🤨 This is the question I get asked the most often, and I (finally) have a good answer! At Hexa, I partner with entrepreneurs ~3x/year, a CEO and CTO for each project— essentially “marrying” 6x/year to build the best partnerships. I look for 4 key traits in my co-founders ⤵️ ⚡️ Energy booster Building and growing a company is about convincing people to follow you—investors, clients, team members—and the person’s natural energy is a key factor in achieving this. I call these people exothermic: they move things around them simply by the energy they exude. How do I test this? I need to feel more energized at the end of a meeting with them than I did at the start. ⏰ Sense of urgency The higher the velocity in a startup, the faster it will grow. Having a deep need to act and get things done sets the fast-paced tempo I’m looking for. 🧑‍🏫 Thirst for self-improvement Founders who are constantly looking to improve by proactively seeking feedback and showing vulnerability have an endless strength to overcome the (inevitable) challenges of entrepreneurship. 🏋️‍♀️ Commitment Being a founder means making your company part of your top priorities, it’s a journey that’s all-consuming. If you believe you embody these traits and are ready to build a transformative company, let’s connect!

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💟 This is the kind of news that makes you love Venture Capital! 🦄🇫🇷 Some will only remember the €1.5 billion exit for a French company. It's not a UNICORN valuation, it's a real EXIT! 3️⃣ 6️⃣ Some will only remember the x36 multiple on investment. 💥 Some will only remember the €175 million proceeds returned to the funds with a single operation. 👑What I'll remember, is Denis Ladegaillerie's passion, vision, and ambition. These are the keys to success. Excited to share this fantastic news for Believe, for Ventech, but also for the entire Tech ecosystem! 🚀 #VentureCapital #SuccessStory cc France Digitale

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I’ve been anticipating more creative M&A stories ever since Swile acquired employee benefits platform Bimpli, a subsidiary of Groupe BPCE in 2023. At the time, I dubbed what Loïc Soubeyrand, Swile’s CEO and Founder, successfully executed a Private Reverse Merger (or PReM). It’s when a smaller, fast-growing but loss-making private tech company acquires a private incumbent that’s larger, slow-growing, but profitable. Sure enough, 2024 has already brought us three new PReM stories. Last week, sennder (Nine years old, Series D company) announced its acquisition of C.H. Robinson’s European Surface Transportation operations (109 years old, global logistics platform). It is set to double the company’s annual revenue from €700m to €1.4bn (so also qualifies as a Merger of Equals) and catapult it to the top five European companies in its industry. Back in February, Cohesity (11 years old, Series F) announced its merger with the data protection business at Veritas Technologies LLC (41 years old, international enterprise) in February to form a new company that will work with 96 of the Fortune 100 and 80% of the Global 500. And in May, computer vision company Metropolis Technologies (7 years old, Series C) announced its acquisition of parking network SP+ (SP Plus). The deal will make Metropolis, originally a software company, the biggest parking network operator in North America. Like Swile, Sennder, Cohesity and Metropolis have accelerated their path to greater scale and profitability with their PReMs, while offering to the incumbent a potential exposure to a growth story trading at higher multiples, creating a win-win scenario for both sides. This approach can also offer scale-ups… ✔️ A faster path to liquidity and a premium valuation as a larger company and possible category leader ✔️ A de-risked business with a reduction in future dilution ✔️ Better terms for raising debt with a profitable business in the future (And by the way, two years after the Swile / BPCE merger, the integration is still going incredibly smoothly. One added benefit that we hadn’t anticipated back then: having the agility of a startup while having the support of a large banking group.) We’re not fully in the clear with private markets and the IPO market is tight, but these companies are more proof that creative M&A should be high on scale-ups’ agendas.

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The Venture market is very weird right now and it sometimes feels like we are in the hottest and coldest fundraising market ever at the same time. Time to invest or time to wait? I’ve tried to summarize my understanding of what’s happening in a blogpost. 

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🌍 𝑴𝒆𝒆𝒕 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒐𝒔𝒕 𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒗𝒆 𝑯𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒕𝒉𝑻𝒆𝒄𝒉 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑩𝒊𝒐𝒕𝒆𝒄𝒉 𝒊𝒏𝒗𝒆𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒔 𝒐𝒇 2024 𝒈𝒍𝒐𝒃𝒂𝒍𝒍𝒚! 🌍 If you’re a startup in the #HealthTech or #Biotech industry, here are some of the top investors around the world actively funding innovative companies: 𝐄𝐮𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞 • 𝐇𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐓𝐞𝐜𝐡 𝐆𝐫𝐮̈𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐬 (Germany): €100K - €3M, Seed Stage • Kurma Partners (France): €500K - €3M, Early Stage • Idinvest Capital Partners (France): €500K - €2M, Seed and Growth Stage • 𝐁𝐎𝐌 𝐁𝐫𝐚𝐛𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐕𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐬 (Netherlands): €100K - €5M, Pre-seed to Early Stage • Verve Ventures (Switzerland): €500K - €3M, Seed to Series B 𝐀𝐬𝐢𝐚 • Shenzhen Capital Group Co., Ltd (China): $500K - $10M, Seed to Late Stage • Kalaari Capital (India): $500K - $5M, Seed and Early Stage • Chiratae Ventures (India): $100K - $10M, Pre-seed to Series A • @IDG Ventures (India): $500K - $5M, Seed to Early Stage • Antler (Singapore): $100K - $30M, Pre-seed to Series A 𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚 • Bessemer Venture Partners (USA): $100K - $1B, Seed to Growth Stage • General Catalyst (USA): $100K - $1B, Seed to Series C • 8VC (USA): $500K - $10M, Seed to Series C • Atlas Venture (USA): $100K - $5M, Seed and Early Stage • Lux Capital (USA): $100K - $25M, Seed and Early Stage 𝐌𝐢𝐝𝐝𝐥𝐞 𝐄𝐚𝐬𝐭 • Walden Catalyst Ventures (Israel): $1M - $25M, Seed and Early Stage • Shorooq Partners (UAE): $500K - $5M, Seed and Series A • Crescent Enterprises Ventures (UAE): $500K - $10M, Seed to Growth Stage • Wamda Capital Capital (UAE): $100K - $5M, Seed to Series A • Middle East Venture Partners (MEVP) East Venture Partners (Lebanon/UAE): $100K - $3M, Seed and Early Stage Do you know people which may need this info? Share with them this post. 💼 Are you ready to secure your funding? Let Tech Add-Venture Accelerator help you scale and grow! 🏆 Early Applications are open until October 31! Link in the first comment! Fallow Andreea Marinescu for more insights about how you can secure your next round from investors! #HealthTech #Biotech #Startups #VentureCapital #TechAddventureAccelerator

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💰 We invested in StackOne 3m seed round last November. As we are not a VC, our edge come to be the best at supporting founders. 👉 We bring in 2 elements: expertise as well as business intros (revenue) 🤝 How: by giving access to our vetted community of top notch operators from scale-ups and unicorns. Thanks Romain Sestier for your trust ! #startups #investor #operators

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Whether you're a French startup founder or investing in the French tech ecosystem, this is a must-have resource: The Serena 2024 Edition of the Ultimate VC List is live! Fundraising can be incredibly time-consuming. That’s why, back in 2016, Serena created the Ultimate VC List to streamline the process for entrepreneurs in France. Now an interactive platform, it has supported over 100,000 entrepreneurs and VCs in the ecosystem. Some key trends Sébastien Le Roy and Maxime Furet spotted when putting this edition together: 🚀 The French VC ecosystem is thriving with new funds like Resonance, OVNI Capital, Yellow, and Varsity, signaling a vibrant and expanding market. 🌍 There’s increased interest from US and European funds for French startups, particularly in AI and climate tech, and a rise in non-traditional investors such as Business Angel Clubs and Family Offices (which are now covered by a new section). 🔧 Infrastructure investors are playing a critical role in funding innovative hybrid models amid global warming challenges. ♻️ The growing presence of impact VCs highlights the focus on socially and environmentally impactful investments.

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💸 Our business angel cash-out guide is out! 💸 I put together these 4 rules, compiling years of experience advising the best VC investors in managing their portfolio and their exit strategies ( 👋 Romain Afflelou Jean-David BENICHOU Jeremie Attali Marc Menasé Patrice Giami Fanny MIARA) For early-stage investors, finding the right monetization path is a significant challenge. The best, and most complex, option is selling shares on the secondary market. I put together this guide to help early stage venture investors maximize their returns, structured around four major rules RULE 👍 : Prepare this transaction strategy ahead of time RULE 🤘 : Find the right timing to do so RULE 👌 : Price their shares on the secondary market RULE 👊 : Efficiently manage your secondary process You can access the full version of the guide on https://lnkd.in/eqY2XQ_M If you want advice on how to maximize your portfolio I am more than happy to seat with you and discuss your strategy - just book a timeslot in my agenda https://lnkd.in/eFCPXU_g #venturecapital #businessangel #ROI #secondary #portfoliomanagement

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Looking for VC investment in your Open Source based company? this is what is important says Maxime Corbani #opensource

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Should You Raise Funds from VCs at the Pre-Seed Stage? I have a clear stance on this: it's better to spend this time on execution. This is something I’ve emphasized in consultations over the past couple of weeks. Why? Because there are many funds out there that claim to invest at the pre-seed and seed stages. Founders compile lists of these funds, reach out, and - voila! They get a response, and even a call is scheduled. At this point, founders might think they’re close to securing the funds, but from the VC side, this is often just part of their deal flow gathering process. An associate will take the call, listen attentively, and tell you that you’re doing great and have an interesting idea. They’ll ask you to keep them updated on your progress. Then, they’ll put your startup’s info into a CRM, and if you’re lucky, they might check back in a few months to see if you have traction. Of course, it’s possible that you’ll captivate them and secure an investment. But in most cases I’ve seen, founders spend 2-3 months (or even up to 6) trying to raise funds from VCs, only to find that they could’ve spent that time on execution instead. With some initial traction, you’ll open the doors to a broader range of seed investors who are ready to invest in a project with proof of traction. If you have a stellar team and are a second-time founder with a successful exit, you likely don’t need this exercise, as you probably already have a line of interested investors - especially those who backed you before. As for whether you should raise pre-seed funds from angel investors and how to go about it - that’s something I can discuss in my next post. Show some unicorns 🦄 here if you’re interested!

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