The company, which employs some 300 people including 250 in France, is looking for a buyer. Since its creation in 2009, the start-up has never won money.
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All is not pink in the world of French tech. At the time of France and the government boast of counting, every week, a new “unicorn”, these start-ups worth more than $ 1 billion (896 million euros), SIGFOX, star of French technology In the mid-2010s, the wing. The company specialized in network for connected objects was placed, Wednesday, January 26, in court recovery by the Toulouse Commercial Court.
The six-month observation period granted by the Tribunal “must make it possible to identify, through the implementation of an assignment plan, new purchasers with the capacity to work for long-term development From SIGFOX, and to propose a job retention, “explains the company in a statement. Located in Labège (Haute-Garonne), near Toulouse, Sigfox employs about 300 people, including 250 in France. The company would preferably target an industrial buyer, interested in his home technology.
Cocreated in 2009 by Ludovic The Moan and Christophe Foutet, Sigfox was the initiator of a telecom network called “0g”. Its principle: low frequencies that allow to connect objects (transport pallets, measuring devices …) with low energy and bandwidth consumption.
300 million euros lifted in total
But Ludovic the Moan wanted to hit hard: a global network, if not anything, which required significant financial resources. SIGFOX, which openly dreamed of a stock market entry, raised, in total, nearly € 300 million from renowned investors: Bpifrance, the European Investment Bank (EIB), Investment Funds Idinvest, Partech or Elliott.
Industrialists have been seduced, as a total, through its total venture capital fund intel Ventures, Intel or Horizon, the investment company of Henri Seydoux, founder of the manufacturer of Parrot Drones and son of Jérôme Seydoux (Pathé). The Company also had a prestigious board of directors, with, at its head, Anne Lauvergeon, the former President of the Directory of AREVA.
But it was not enough. While SIGFOX spent its money into building its network in France, Germany and the United States, supplemented by agreements with local partners in 75 countries, customers have not followed, not enough in any case to cover the Operating costs.
A loss of 90.7 million in 2020
Since its creation, society has never won money. In 2020, according to documents filed at the Registry of the Commercial Court, SIGFOX lost € 90.7 million. What to create tensions at the head of society. Ludovic The Moan was replaced in February 2021 at the General Management by Jeremy Prince, which ranked before that the American subsidiary of SIGFOX. A job safeguard plan had been implemented in September 2020 (47 posts had been removed).
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