Alkemics eyes European growth following Series C round

Alkemics, a Paris-based startup whose platform enables brands to launch products with retailers, has raised €21 million in a Series C funding round.

Growth stage fund Highland Europe has joined the company’s investors, while Cathay Innovation, Index Ventures, SEB Alliance and Serena Capital also participated in the round. 

Since raising €20 million in 2016, Alkemics has worked with grocery retailers in France and the UK (including E.Leclerc, Intermarché, Casino, Tesco and Ocado) to digitise their commercial processes with more than 17,000 brands.

Its platform connects retailers like Intermarché and Tesco to multinational suppliers such as Nestlé, as well as small local producers. In 2019, over 7.5 million messages were exchanged through it.

“Our aim is to make B2B business quick, easy and interactive. Any manufacturer should be able to put a product on the market as easily as if they were posting a message on a social network, and any store should be able to find the products that consumers are looking for by simply searching through an app” says Antoine Durieux, Co-founder and CEO, Alkemics (pictured above).

“Our platform is helping thousands of suppliers and retailers across Europe to work closely together, to simplify their collaboration, to speed up products go-to-market and to ensure that product data is always as transparent and up to date as possible”.

After starting out in France and the UK, Alkemics will use the new funds to launch in other parts of Europe, beginning with Germany, Benelux and Scandinavia.

“The last two months have demonstrated to everyone how retail technology is a critical part of our infrastructure. Alkemics’ high level of technological functionality and ultra-flexible data model can tackle all different verticals in the retail industry and is therefore able to respond rapidly and effectively to unprecedented levels of demand, at the outset of the coronavirus pandemic in Europe,” says Tony Zappala, Partner at Highland Europe.

“As things start to return to normal, retailers and suppliers will want to continue with this new digitised collaboration through the platform, which has helped to increase their productivity as well as ensuring that the shopper has all the information they need to make an informed purchase.”

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