Venture Capital · Profile from Venture Capital Research Companion
Partech (Partech Partners, incl. Partech Africa)
A transatlantic venture firm founded in San Francisco in 1982 as Paribas's technology venture arm, which became independent, moved its centre of gravity to Paris, and rebuilt itself after 2008 into a multi-strategy platform (seed, venture, growth, Africa, impact), best known today for backing French software and consumer companies and for running Partech Africa, one of the largest funds dedicated to African tech.
At a glance
- Founded
- 1982, San Francisco, as Paribas Technologies, the corporate venture arm of French bank Banque Paribas
- Founders
- Founding team included Vincent Worms and Tom McKinley (with Paribas as sponsor)
- Headquarters
- Paris; offices or teams in San Francisco, Berlin, Dakar, Nairobi, Lagos and Dubai (2024–26)
- Ownership / structure
- Independent, partner-owned manager (spun out of Paribas within roughly a decade of founding); separate fund families for seed (Partech Entrepreneur), venture (Partech Venture / Partech International), growth (Partech Growth), Africa (Partech Africa) and impact (Partech Impact)
- Leadership (2026)
- Managing partners include Philippe Collombel, Jean-Marc Patouillaud and Nicolas El Baze (venture/firm leadership); Romain Lavault (seed); Reza Malekzadeh, Omri Benayoun and Bruno Crémel (growth); Cyril Collon and Tidjane Dème (Africa). Current titles and any 2025–26 changes: verify
- AUM / capital raised
- ~€2.5–2.7bn under management (reported, 2023–25; sources vary between ~€2.5bn and ~$2.7bn)
- Stage focus
- Multi-stage: seed checks ~€300k–€3m (Partech Entrepreneur IV); Series A–C venture; growth checks ~$15–60m; Africa checks ~$1–15m from seed to Series C
- Signature investments
- Business Objects (seed, 1990; first European tech company on Nasdaq; sold to SAP), InvenSense, Akeneo, Alan, Sorare, ManoMano, EcoVadis, M-Files, Jellysmack; Africa: Wave, Yoco, TradeDepot, Reliance Health. Instructive failures: Made.com (IPO 2021, administration 2022); Sorare's post-2021 contraction
9 deals and moves analysed
Each one gets a full strategy file in the companion: context, the decision, the financing, what happened, and the lesson.
1990
Business Objects
Seed
2005
InvenSense
Venture Round
2016
Alan
Seed
2016
Made com
Growth Round
2017
Akeneo
Series B
2018
TradeDepot
Series A
2018
Wave
Seed / Early Investment
2019
Yoco
Series B
2020
Sorare
Seed