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Emblem , a comparatively new European VC firm based in Paris , is announcing the final closing of its first fund . Eighteen calendar month after thefirst closing , the Emblem squad managed to secure € 80 million in full ( around $ 85 million at current central rates ) .
This is no small feat in the current funding environs . According to Atomico ’s late body politic of European Tech report , in 2024,venture financial backing fell for the third year in a row . One of the main reasons for this is that learning and IPO are n’t really happening aright now .
As a result , VC as an investment category is less attractive than it used to be . Several VC firm are struggling to raise follow - on funds despite the current artificial intelligence boom , which could potentially play a Brobdingnagian investment opportunity .
But that did n’t block up Emblem from hand its hard cap — the maximal amount that it had originally set to arouse . Founded by Bénédicte de Raphélis Soissan and Guillaume Durao , the duo had already made some interesting investments as business angels before create Emblem . They clothe in crypto trading card gameSorare , preferent insurance startupDalma , and crop meat companyGourmey , to name a few .
They wanted to go one dance step further with a right VC business firm , which to Emblem , a seed investment firm that require to make 25 to 30 investments with its initial fund . Ideally , they would rather go or co - lead seeded player rounds with tickets ranging from € 500,000 to € 3 million . But the firm is uncoerced to follow another lead investor if there ’s a estimable opportunity , too .
Emblem has already invested in 16 startup since its first closing in March 2023 . TechCrunch has covered a few of them . Examples admit :
It ’s a diverse portfolio when it comes to field of focus , but also geographical focus . “ We ’ve made 16 investment . To give you an approximation , there are eight of them in France , six in the Nordics — Denmark , Sweden — and then we made one in the U.S. and one in Italy , ” de Raphélis Soissan told TechCrunch .
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Emblem ’s magnetic core focus remains on France and the Nordic tech ecosystem . It has more than 200 circumscribed partners who invest in the first store , let in kinfolk offices and technical school entrepreneurs , such as the founder of Unity , Pleo , Qonto , 3Shape , Spendesk , Voodoo , PennyLane , JobandTalent , Ledger , and Zendesk . They make up for over half of the total amount .
The repose has been raised from several funds of stock , as well as commitment from both EIFO ( the Danish sovereign fund ) and Bpifrance ( the French sovereign fund ) . Emblem is already thinking about its next investment trust , which should be about the same size as this one .
“ Now we ’ve generate a bit of clock time when we wo n’t require to raise . So we ’re going to savor it . But you never want to be off - market , ” de Raphélis Soissan say . “ So , since it takes you four year to deploy , and we ’re about halfway through , that think of that in a twelvemonth ’s time , we ’ll have to start all over again . ”
