👋...to our Deep Dive into SportsTech in France.

The Olympics have started in spectacular fashion with the Opening Ceremony captivating the world and the competitions unfolding against a backdrop of French icons. Beyond the fanfare over the next month, the nation is hoping that the impact of these Games will be more enduring.

Over the past two years, planning for the Games has created greater visibility for the nation's SportsTech ecosystem. While still small compared to other startup sectors, boosters believe there is massive potential to create a thriving sports economy driven by innovation that will deliver both financial and health benefits to the nation.

After ignoring the sector for many years, the government, institutions, and investors are now rallying to the cause. Over the past year, any major tech or business conference in France included SportsTech as a major theme. The government has rolled out a series of new sports-theme programs. And investors – often led by former professional athletes – are getting in the game.

Our SportsTech Special Report takes the pulse of this sector, highlighting the key actors, challenges, and opportunities:

🏅 Sector Deep Dive: A panorama of the current investment landscape, the global competition, the key ecosystem actors, government strategies, and investors. (Read it here)

🚴 Startups To Watch: Entrepreneurs are tackling challenges ranging from health to fan experience to athletic performance optimization. A list of the most promising startups. (Read it here)

🏃 Spotlight Interview: Kinomap is the official organizer of a connected marathon for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. The interactive event will give the SportsTech startup global visibility that it hopes to leverage to pursue its goal of reinventing the way people watch sports. Kinomap Founder Philippe Moity explains the company's journey and ambitions. (Read it here)

🏋️ Spotlight Interview: Seventure Partners' Bruno Rivet discusses the firm's pioneering SportsTech fund: "We believe that the Olympics will serve as a catalyst, encouraging the growth of new and emerging startups, and we're excited to see how it will shape our journey moving forward." (Read it here)

🤽‍♂️ Interview: Jacques D'Arrigo is Co-Founder of startup Footbar and President of SporTech FR, a national association representing sports startups and entrepreneurs. D'Arrigo spoke with us about how and why the potential of the SportsTech economy is finally being unlocked in France. (Read it here)

🏆 Interview: Paris 2024 Olympic Innovation Chief Omar El Zayat explains how the Olympic Committee sourced 600 startups and chose 17 to work with the Paris Games – and what this could mean for France's SportsTech future. (Read it here)

⚽ Video: Origins, a venture fund that is mostly French but not exclusively, brings together a stable of big-name athletes and influencers. French Soccer/football star Blaise Matuidi and Ilan Abehassera (NYC-based CEO of Dots) spoke with me on stage at VivaTech in 2023 about the intersection of sports stars, influencers, and investing. (Watch it here)

🏉 Edito: French Rugby star Benjamin Kayser explains why he co-founded Teampact Ventures: "I've always seen similarities in resilience, drive, mindset, and the mental capacity to rise above adversity and overcome all the challenges that lie ahead." (Read it here)

🦄 Video: Sorare CEO Nicolas Julia on building France's SportsTech Unicorn: "We have one goal, which is to build the biggest brand in the world of sports. To do that, five years from here, we want to have the biggest community in the world of sports." (Watch it here)

🌱 Seed Spotlight: Omada (the word means "team" in Greek) is a sports prediction mechanism that allows users to compete against each other. Players receive a set number of virtual coins each day which they can use to make predictions, and if they are successful they earn more coins to play. CEO Adrien Miniatti discusses how he hopes the €7.1 million Seed Round and an impressive roster of Business Angels will support Omada's international growth. (Read it here)

🦸‍♀️ Deep Dive: Les Sportives is a digital media and publishing startup that focuses on female athletes. Its success has made Founder Aurélie Bresson a leading voice in the fight for greater recognition for female athletes in France. (Read it here)

Plus:

The Big Deals: Odaseva, TRicares, Enerdigit, and Pixmania were among the big VC rounds in June! (Read the full list here)

Finally, here is your friendly reminder that this newsletter is free. 😉🥂 Upgrade to a paid membership to get full access to all the articles and archives. 🏆

📺 📈 ⬆️ Television is back in a big way! The Olympics are proving to be a massive win for France's national broadcaster, France Télévisions. As the official Olympics media partner, they’re expecting every single French citizen to tune in at some point, either on their France 2 channel or through their streaming platform. Friday’s Olympic opening ceremony was a hit, with 23.4 million viewers glued to their screens. That's just shy of the record 24 million viewers for the epic 2022 World Cup match between France and Argentina. ⚽️

🇫🇷👋➡️ Big news in the tech world! Clara Chappaz, Director of La French Tech, is stepping down. She announced she won’t be renewing her 3-year contract, following in the footsteps of her predecessors. Her term officially ends in October 2024, but she’ll be leaving at the end of September. With political uncertainty in the air, La French Tech isn’t expecting a flood of candidates...so stay tuned for the next chapter! 👀

🤖🏴‍☠️ ⬇️ Along with a booming GenAI scene comes booming piracy! According to a recent French Senate report: "Combating Malicious Foreign Influences: Mobilizing the Nation Against the New Cold War," foreign digital interference is on the rise in France. Propaganda videos, fake news on social media, and cyberattacks against public figures are becoming more frequent. "With AI, the threat of foreign interference is supercharged," says Rachid Temal, Senator of Val-d'Oise. 🛡️

🛜 🙅⬇️ After several of France’s high-speed train lines were sabotaged hours before Friday's Olympic opening ceremony, creating mayhem at Paris's major train stations, a new series attacks of attacks have taken place. Mobile phone and internet connections have been severely disrupted in several areas of France after vandals cut through fiber optic cables in six departments (Aude, Hérault, Marne, Meuse, Bouches-du-Rhône & Vaucluse). It is not yet known if the latest attacks are related to the acts of sabotage against the TGVs. Investigations are underway .🕵️‍♂️

The Olympics have focused attention on a sector that many believe has great potential but has lacked investment and government support. Over the last two years, a wide range of actors and institutions have rallied to the cause. Will it be enough? And will this momentum last beyond the Games?

This Sector Deep Dive provides a panorama of the state of SportsTech in France and the people, startups, investors, and public actors who are shaping this market. 

Millions are pouring into Paris for the 2024 Olympic Games. Following last Friday's spectacular opening ceremony, Paris will be the world’s sports capital for the next month.

With the Olympics being a live event, the coming weeks shouldn’t normally be a busy time for an online fitness platform. Unless that startup is Kinomap.

On August 10 and 11, the interactive SportsTech startup will host tens of thousands of fitness enthusiasts on its platform as part of the Paris Olympics’ Marathon pour Tous (Marathon for All). A notable addition to the Olympic Games, Marathon pour Tours will allow amateur marathoners around the globe to run the same route as the official Olympic marathon from home or the gym via the Kinomap app. Runners of the marathon route will pass through nine of the Île-de-France region’s districts, past some of Paris’ landmark monuments, through the region’s iconic parks and forests, all the way to the majestic Palace of Versailles, and back again.

It’s a big moment for Kinomap, an interactive training app for indoor cycling, running, and rowing. Kinomap is the official organizer of the Connected Marathon in partnership with the Olympic Games. The total number of marathon participants, both physical and digital, is expected to reach 300,000, making it the largest marathon race the world has ever seen – and giving Kinomap a moment on the global stage. 

We caught up with Kinomap founder and CEO Philippe Moity to understand Kinomap’s role in the Marathon Pour Tous, how the app will facilitate the race, and how the marathon will impact Kinomap’s trajectory.

What: Odaseva, a Salesforce data management and backup platform.

Why: A complementary solution to Salesforce that allows businesses to back up, archive, and protect their data.

Why: A complementary solution to Salesforce that allows businesses to back up, archive, and protect their data.

Funding: €50.5 million
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Who: Co-founders Sovan Bin, Vincent Delamarre, Remy Claret, and Richard Zolezzi

‌Investors: Silver Lake Waterman, Eurazeo, Crescent Cove, F-Prime, Eight Roads, and Serena Capital

‌What's Next: The new funding will allow the company to expand its product offerings and expansion into new markets.

What: TRiCares, a French-German MedTech, and developer of a catheter-based valve replacement system designed to treat tricuspid regurgitation

Why: To treat Tricuspic Regurgitation (TR) with a minimally invasive procedure and without the need for open heart surgery. This implantation technique also allows the treatment of severely ill patients.

Funding: $50 million
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Who: Ahmed Elmouelhi (CEO), Esther Gerteis (VP of regulatory affairs) Laura Gihone (COO) Investors: An undisclosed strategic investor previously (current Series D). The company's 2022 $55m (€51m) Series C round was financed by 415 Capital, Andera Partners, Bayern Kapital, BioMed Partners, Credit Mutuel Innovation, GOCapital, Karista & Wellington Partners.

What's Next: TRiCares recently secured an Investigational Device Exemption (IDE) for an EFS from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The study will commence in the coming months, with patients to be enrolled at up to 8 potential sites in the US and Canada, overseen by leading principal investigators Susheel Kodali, MD (NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center) and Gorav Ailawadi, MD (University of Michigan Health System).

What: Enerdigit, an electric load shedding and consumption monitoring solution.

Why: To facilitate the modernization of the electrical grid and the rise of the smart grid movement and analyze and control energy consumption in real-time for manufacturers.

Funding: €20 million
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Who: Founder Bénédicte Pléau

‌Investors: Ring Capital, Bpifrance, and Océan Participations

‌What's Next: The new funding will allow the startup to develop a second activity: managing XXL batteries connected to the electrical grid. These batteries will store energy during low consumption periods and release it during peak consumption times. The first battery is already operational under the Cheviré bridge in Nantes.

What: Pixmania, an electronic goods-commerce site turned marketplace for refurbished mobile phones.

Why: To make the buying and selling of used mobile phones more simple, accessible, and responsible, sellers can trade in their old mobile phones and the price of the old phone is immediately deducted from the purchase of a new model.

Funding: €11.5 million
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Who: Co-founders Jean-Emile Rosenblum & Steve Rosenblum Investors: MACSF, Breega, Groupe Duval, and Business Angels

What's Next: The recently re-born startup plans to strengthen its position as a leader in the refurbished technology market by hiring new talents. Its target is to exceed 500,000 refurbished appliances by 2026, saving almost 12,000 tonnes of CO2.

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