Global investment firm Partech has announced its new €92 million fund named “Partech Entrepreneur III”, which it will use to invest in seed-stage startups working in ‘post-COVID trend areas’ of health, work, commerce, finance, mobility and computing, across Europe, Asia and the US.
Despite the lockdown, the Fund is actively investing to support early-stage startups in the reboot of what our personal and professional lives will look like in years ahead. With 3 billion people confined at home, digitalization is bound to dramatically accelerate across sectors and “remote” is emerging as a new standard. This redefines how people live, work and consume, while businesses have to massively switch online and reinvent themselves. The fund states that startups closing seed rounds at the moment are ideally positioned to seize the opportunities lying ahead in the new “normal” world, while incumbents are dealing with old infrastructure and massive cost cutting plans.
Partech is now one of the largest seed investors around the globe, with offices in San Francisco, Paris, Berlin and Dakar. Its seed funds exceed €276 million in total and top 160 investments in 22 countries across Europe, US and Asia. It invests across all stages of seed, from pre-seed rounds of a few hundred thousand euros to pre-Series A rounds of several million euros. The new fund is looking to invest in startups focused on 6 verticals accelerated by the 2020 crisis:
- Future of Health: Personalized, Online, AI-assisted
- Future of Work: Remote, Collaborative, Continuous education
- Future of Commerce: Software-enabled, Social, Instant
- Future of Finance: API-based, Data-driven, Decentralized
- Future of Mobility: Autonomous, Multimodal, On-demand
- Future of Computing: Edge, AI, Wireless
Partech seed funds are large by design, so as to be able to invest pro-rata (or more) in follow-on Series A and B rounds led by other Funds. After 18 months from the initial Partech investment, 2/3 of companies have either raised Series A, or been acquired at a higher valuation. They have raised more than €1.3 billion in follow-on money as of today.
The Partech seed team syncs up monthly with other top international venture funds for upcoming Series A and B rounds of its Seed Portfolio, and has invested alongside and helped build syndicates with more than 100 other leading Funds, including multiple times with Sequoia, Index, Accel, Bessemer, Greycroft, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins, Menlo Ventures and NEA.
Founders will also benefit from being a part of the larger Partech community, which is 400 strong and provides access to key decision makers at a hundred Fortune 500 companies (of which a third are Partech LPs). The Partech platform is very active with dedicated events every 6 weeks, as well as its popular cross-border Talent Marketplace (1,000 job offers and 4,000 candidates currently on the platform). The Founder community is extremely diverse, with first-time and repeat entrepreneurs, from more than 22 countries and 17% of the startups were started by female co-Founders (29% for the seed investments in the last 2 years). These Founders are actively giving back to the community, helping peers, making introductions and even becoming investors themselves.
“The Partech team was there from the beginning to support us from idea to exit. They are great partners for globally minded entrepreneurs. They move quickly to make decisions, helped us navigate critical and strategic decision points in the business. They bring a unique international investing perspective and support network to bear for rapidly scaling companies”, Sujay Tyle, Co-Founder & CEO of Frontier Car Group.
“We didn’t want a VC in our seed round, and then we spoke to Partech. I’m super glad they decided to support us from Day 0, being always there for us to challenge us and help us go to the next stage”, commented Jean-Charles Samuelian-Werve, co-founder and CEO of Alan.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis, Partech Entrepreneur III has closed 8 new investments and is committed to 2 more, contributing to a diversified portfolio across the 6 target verticals accelerated by the 2020 crisis.
via https://www.AiUpNow.com/ by contact@bcurdy.com, Khareem Sudlow
