🔥Hot Seed Deals: Blackleaf, Veesual, Hylight & More
What: Blackleaf, a French leader in Graphene production.
Why: To revolutionize graphene production, a strategic material with multiple applications, crucial for ecological transition.
Funding: €7 million
Who: Co-Founders Yannick Lafue, Housseinou BA, Cuong Pham-Huu
Investors: Armor Group, Bpifrance, CIC, BNP Paribas, and Crédit Agricole Alsace Vosges & circa 50 Business Angels
What's next: The new funding will help fuel the company's growth as it expands the team of 12 to 40 forty employees by 2025. Additionally, the startup's goal is both to establish a real industrial production capacity and, in parallel, to develop solutions and products using graphene.
What: Veesual, a publisher of an artificial intelligence-based virtual reality online clothes fitting solution.
Why: To allow online clothes shoppers to visualize the outfits they want to purchase on themselves before buying, thereby enhancing the way buyers shop online while reducing waste.
Funding: €5 million
Who: Co-founders Maxime Patte & Damien Meurisse
Investors: Axa Venture Partners, Techstars & various Business Angels
What's next: The new money will help accelerate the company's development in the American market with the opening in 2025 of its first US office in New York and the recruitment of senior American talents.
What: Hylight, a manufacturer of multi-sensor hydrogen airship drones for infrastructure inspections and management.
Why: To decarbonize safe air inspection.
Funding: €3.7 million
Who: Co-founders Martin Bocken & Thomas Laporte
Investors: Y Combinator, Ring Capital, Kima Ventures, Collaborative Fund, and Marc Tarpenning (Tesla co-founder)
What's next: The new cash will be used to accelerate the development of its zero-emission aerial data drones.
What: Estaly, an insurtech that simplifies and improves commercial insurance services for consumers and merchants.
Why: To revolutionize insurance for consumers to experience insurance and enable merchants to build connections with their customers.
Funding: €3.6 million
Who: Co-founders Mathis Batoul, Youssef Kanouni, Karim Mezzour
Investors: OneRagtime, CDG Invest & various Business Angels from the retail and insurance sectors.
What's next: The new funding will be used to recruit new talents, in particular technical and product profiles, finance its R&D efforts, and enter new markets.
What: United Visual Researchers (UVR), a startup specializing in modern optical simulation.
Why: To revolutionize industrial design by developing a software suite that produces reliable visual digital twins. UVR significantly reduces the need for physical prototypes through advanced optical simulations.
Funding: €2 million
Who: Co-Founders Thomas Muller & Philippe Porral
Investors: Go Capital
What's next: The new funding will go towards accelerating UVR's international development, particularly in Asia, and support its journey towards profitability.
What: Reverto, a creator of virtual reality training programs to address psychosocial risks in the workplace.
Why: To highlight and help companies overcome sexism, sexual abuse, mental health issues.
Funding: €1.2 million
Who: Founder & CEO Guillaume Clere
Investors: Human Matter and Various Business Angels
What's next: The cash will enable the Lyon-based startup to industrialize its creation process, double the size of its R&D team, and develop a new platform to manage client deployment and virtual reality headset fleets.
What: Mayam, a tech retail solution for managing bulk goods departments.
Why: To help combat single-use packaging by allowing retailers to better manage bulk goods departments and sell more unpackaged products by weight. This includes allowing them to trace unpackaged products, organize shelves, and offer container reuse.
Funding: €450,000
Who: Founder Sébastien Leflond
Investors: France Active Nouvelle-Aquitaine, Nouvelle-Aquitaine Amorçage, Crédit Agricole Pyrénées Gascogne, BNP Paribas, Barakinvest, Région Nouvelle-Aquitaine
What's next: The new money will be used to fuel the startup's commercial development.