French startup Unlatch raises $5.8m funding round by AXA Venture Partners

French startup Unlatch raises $5.8m funding round by AXA Venture Partners

Published: 03-07-2020 11:55:00 | By: Pie Kamau | hits: 5033 | Tags:

Unlatch, a French pioneer in digital real estate sales, announced a $5.8 million financing round, including $4.5 million in equity from AXA Venture Partners and $1.3 million in debt. The transaction aims to strengthen Unlatch's leading position in the market of digitised real estate sales, through the addition of new services and functionalities, and to accelerate the internationalisation of the business, particularly in Spain and the United Kingdom

Unlatch was launched in 2018 by François Marill (HEC), Thomas Rivoire (HEC-lawyer) and Olivier Adam (X-Telecom), who also founded the start-up LegaLife. Unlatch is a B2B software solution dedicated to residential real estate professionals – property developers, brokers, social landlords - that fully digitises the sales process. Thanks to Unlatch, processing times are significantly reduced and the parties involved benefit from an online collaborative tool that makes the entire sales process smoother and simpler all while enriching the relationship with the buyers.

In just over two years, Unlatch has been adopted by nearly 250 property developers, brokers, social landlords, including Quartus, Constructa, Emerige, Demathieu Bard Immobilier, Aqprim etc. Since mid-March 2020 and the beginning of the lockdown period, Unlatch has recorded a 25% increase in its activity. The health crisis has had an accelerating effect on a fundamental trend, the digitisation of the real estate sector. The objective of Unlatch is to maintain its leading position in the market. The fundraising will notably enable Unlatch to enhance the platform with new functionalities in order to offer the best customer experience to both sellers and buyers of real estate.

By choosing AXA Venture Partners, Unlatch is partnering with a fast-growing technology investment fund with a global approach to investing in innovation. The investment fund has a strong international presence with offices in Paris, London, New York, San Francisco and Hong Kong. AXA Venture Partners will support Unlatch with its expansion ambitions outside of France. After Belgium in autumn 2019, Unlatch plans to set up operations in Spain and the UK in 2020.

François Marill and Thomas Rivoire, cofounders of Unlatch: "We are very pleased to join forces with AXA Venture Partners to implement our international development strategy and we welcome François Robinet who joins our board. AVP has a strong international dimension and we could not have asked for a better shareholder to help us accelerate the already very rapid growth of Unlatch. The current economic and health crisis has convinced property developers that digitisation is an inevitable evolution.''

François Robinet, Managing Partner of AXA Venture Partners: "As an investor, we are delighted to support Unlatch and are convinced that the quality of the team and the efficiency of the solution make a real difference in a rapidly changing real estate market. Real estate transactions are complex operations that can massively benefit from the digitisation of processes to make them more efficient and collaborative. This is precisely what Unlatch's technology allows and we are very happy to contribute to this evolution. The Covid-19 crisis has been a catalyst to faster adopt digital solutions. Unlatch has anticipated this movement and will continue to innovate in France and internationally. We are proud to support François, Thomas, Olivier and all their teams in their development projects.''

www.getunlatch.com

www.axavp.com