A good start for French Tech in 2022. French startups raised 5 billion euros in the first three months of the year, a new record for a quarter. As indicated the company EYthis amount is more than twice as high (+150%) than that of the first half of 2021, and has already reached the total for the year 2020!
The ecosystem still seems to be heading for new heights in 2022, after a historic year 2021 ended at 11.6 billion euros raised. French Tech’s access to mega-raises (over 100 million euros), started in 2019-2020 and extended in 2021, contributes greatly to establishing this new record. In other words, they are the figureheads of the ecosystem, and in particular the famous unicorns worth more than a billion dollars, fueling the acceleration of the ecosystem.
A balance powered by mega elevators
As EY notes, it took 234 rounds to reach the €5 billion mark. A sign of French Tech’s upscaling, the quarter’s 11 mega-raises alone concentrate nearly 2.8 billion euros, or more than half of the total amount.
The year also started with an avalanche of mega lifts, 6 of which in a week in January: Payfit (254 million euros), anchorstore (250 million), Qonto (486 million), Back Market (450 million), exotec (293 million) and finally Spendesk (100 million). Result: French Tech closed the month with more than 2.6 billion euros raised and set a new record.
The month of February that followed turned out to be particularly quiet due to the new standards, with “only” 710 million euros elevators and two mega elevators: Deepki (150 million) and Akeneo (123 million). The month of March continued a similar momentum, with two mega-raises again: Alma (115 million) and InterCloud (100 million). But that was without counting on one of the ecosystem figures, Doctolib, who educated 500 million euros mid-month, and thus given a boost.
Historically, the ecosystem’s peaks occur in the spring (May-June) and fall (September-November). In other words, the frenzy of January could resume soon, even if the global economic situation is not at its best with the likely rise in interest rates and geopolitical uncertainty.
