Founded in 2023, Parisian startup Poolside-AI is on track to raise $450 million to revolutionize the software development sector
And a new French nugget in AI? The Parisian startup Poolside-AI, created in April 2023 and specialized in models of intelligent languages dedicated to developers, is in advanced discussions to raise… $450 million, according to sources close to the matter. Led by Enrique Salem of Bain Capital Ventures, this round of funding valued Poolside at nearly $2 billionBain Capital Ventures had already backed Poolside in its initial funding round in 2023.
The fundraising represents a significant jump from the $126 million raised in the previous round last August, when the startup was valued at $526 million. Investors included Xavier Niel, Felicis and Redpoint Ventures. A quadrupled valuation in less than a year would confirm the relevance and viability of the project of the French startup.
AI for developers, a new area of double-digit growth
Founded by two big names, Jason Warner, former CTO of GitHub, and Eiso Kant, co-founder of Athenian (acquired by the Linux Foundation), the very young Poolside-AI has not yet generated significant revenues but is already showing promising signs of commercial efficiency. The demand for coding assistants is indeed growing strongly, as evidenced by the success of GitHub-Copilot, developed by Microsoft with Open-AI, which has 1.8 million paying subscribers, in increase of 40% over the last quarter 2023 !
Dollars are definitely raining down on AI!
Other French startups are also standing out in the AI sector:
- Hugging Face – Franco-American created in 2015 – with its natural language processing models, raised another $235 million in 2023.
- Dataiku, specialized in data platforms, reached a valuation of $4.6 billion after raising $600 million between 2021 and 2022.
- Owkin, in the field of AI for medical research, raised $180 million in 2021, bringing its valuation at nearly a billion.
- Bioptimus, a newcomer planning to develop an AI dedicated to biology, has raised $35 million in 2023.
- Without forgetting Mistral AI, another rising star, who recently raised $385 million to develop generative AI models,
- or even, last arrival, H, startup that wants to revolutionize data analysis with cutting-edge AI solutions, which raised no less than 220 million dollars in May 2024.
This dynamic demonstrates the strength of the French AI ecosystem. An ecosystem that is attracting more and more massive and stimulating investments for innovation in a key and promising sector.
