Today, investment firm Elaia has announced the close of a new fund at €77 million for Europe’s up-and-coming deeptech startups. Working in partnership with Inria, the fund is well over its initial target of €65 million, demonstrating that Europe’s investment landscape is alive and well.
Based in Paris, Elaia has been championing investment in startups across Europe since 2002 and is certainly one of the continent’s most well-known names. The company has just reaffirmed its commitment to investing in Europe – closing its second deeptech dedicated fund at €77 million. Elaia Alpha II Fund is to become a key part of the firm’s proactive strategy to promote technological entrepreneurship.
Leaidign ivnestors taking part in this exciitg new capital pool include VINCI Concessions, Inria, Bpifrance for the Fonds National d’Amorçage 2 (FNA 2), Covéa Finance, BNP Paribas, L’Oréal and Malakoff Humanis.
Inria is a key partner in this fund as the relationship between Inria and Elaia has continued to grow over time. In early 2019, Inria announced the launch of Inria startup studio, in partnership with Bpifrance, to support, from 2023 on, over 100 startup projects per year.
Dedicated to the deep tech space, the money will be deployed in pre-seed and seed stages in 30-40 European startups in various sectors – including AI, data science, digital health, cybersecurity, digital infrastructures, enterprise software, industrial IoT and embedded systems. Already 14 investments have been made – highlighting just how proactive the team aim to be.
Anne-Sophie Carrese, partner at Elaia, commented: “We are delighted with this new deep tech seed fund at Elaia, which together with PSL Innovation Fund, give us a firepower of €153M to invest in technological startups close to research. We now have 33 startups in the deep tech seed portfolio, and see success reaching go to market, refinancing and international development.”
The firm has supported startups like Criteo, SeqOne, Armis and Elevo – so this new cohort of startups will be in great company. All investments made by Elaia are also considered around ESG principles.
There’s no doubt that seeing big tech funds like this open up is a great sign for early-stage startups and it’s a positive sign to see in the innovation space. However, what European startups really need is long-term support and confidence that investments won’t dry up. It’ll be interesting to see how this fund, like others that have been recently closed, will develop and scale selected startups.
Elaia has also made two new strategic changes in the company – appointing Anne Bouverot as a board member and Sébastien Lefebvre as a partner. Anne is to become the firm’s newest and first independent board member. Having previous experience in corporate governance and leadership in her 25+ year career in telecoms, information technology and media.
Anne Bouverot, stated: “ I am very proud to join the Board of Elaia, the leading European VC backing deep tech startups. I am convinced that paving the way to a sustainable and inclusive digital transition implies to think and act concretely at European scale. Accelerating the pioneering Tech startups in AI, data science, cybersecurity, or digital health, driven by a common taste of innovation, is a way to decoding tomorrow and a path to soft power- promoting European values and vision of society, concern for social impact and an ethical sensibility.”
Newly appointed partner, Sébastien Lefebvre, has previosuly been invovled with Elaia as Venture Partner. He has had an interesting career indeed, including time spent as the Director of Growth, EMEA at Twitter. Now based in Barcelona, he is committed to supporting deep tech startups across Europe.
He stated: “I’m delighted to join Elaia as a Partner. In addition to having an exceptional track record, the team is challenging, inspiring and extremely supportive to entrepreneurs. I look forward to contributing to the success of Elaia, our LPs and our portfolio companies, in France and internationally.”
