After raising 5.14 billion euros in the first half of the year, French Tech seems on track to cross the 10 billion euros mark in fundraising at the end of the year. But other markets are also benefiting from the global advent of tech.
Fundraising does not always represent relevant indicators for measuring the success of a start-up. There are other keys for this, such as turnover, profitability, the number of jobs created, the equitable redistribution of value or even the company’s capacity for innovation. The fact remains that the colossal amounts of the roundtables operated by French Tech in 2021 can hardly be ignored.
10 billion euros raised in 2021?
According to barometer EY of venture capital in France for the first half of this year, French start-ups raised no less than 5.14 billion euros in 416 deals, in the first six months of the year alone. That is an increase of 90% compared to the same period a year earlier. Over the whole of 2020, French Tech had raised 5.39 billion euros in 620 rounds of funding. Among these, we can cite the 173 million euro fundraising of Contentsquare in May 2020, financing that had enabled it to reach the Grail of valuation at more than one billion dollars which grants the status of unicorn, or that of 255 million euros from Mirakl, in September 2020.
The first half of 2021 also goes beyond the whole of 2019, which saw the ecosystem of French technology start-ups raise 5.03 billion euros. Among the biggest fundraising completed in 2021 are that – once again – of Contentsquare (408 million euros), but also the financing of Ledger (312 million euros), IAD (300 million euros), BackMarket ( 276 million euros) and Alan (185 million euros).
“At this rate, the symbolic 10 billion mark should be crossed this year”, assures the EY report.
Internet services on the move
Unsurprisingly, in a year of a global pandemic still marked by the acceleration of the digital dependence of businesses and individuals, sectoral detail shows that internet services are a driving force. Start-ups in the sector concentrate almost half of the value of financing. However, fintechs experienced spectacular growth, with € 1.1 billion raised through 44 deals. The top 5 sectors are completed by start-ups dedicated to life sciences (564 million euros in 67 rounds), software and IT services (390 million euros in 38 rounds) and “cleantech” (215 million euros in 27 operations).
Investments still in the majority in Île-de-France
No offense to a French Tech mission which seeks to decentralize innovation on French territory, the vast majority (81%) of the money invested in venture capital or development capital in the technological industry continues to be paid in Île-de-France. This is more than in the year 2020, where the region, which nevertheless represents only 18.2% of the population of France, had attracted 75% of the amounts raised. In the first quarter of 2021, the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, already a good student in this area last year, attracted 5% of investments. Occitanie takes third place in the Hauts-de-France region, with 2% of the amounts raised.
Germany overtakes France
The only major shadow on the board in this already record year for French Tech, Germany, “with which France had hitherto been on an equal footing”, but who “is now doing better than us with 7.83 billion euros in funds raised for 313 operations”, EY note. The United Kingdom also continues to attract the majority of tech investments in Europe, with 16.44 billion euros in funds raised for 861 operations (+ 243% compared to the first half of 2020). The three markets combined finally remain very far behind the United States, which is still evolving in a league light years from Europe with around 132 billion euros (155 billion dollars) raised over the first six months of the year. year, or increases of 116% year-on-year and 66% quarterly, according to Crunchbase.
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