Blisce has become the latest VC firm to launch a fund dedicated to climate technology, for which it plans to raise up to 150 million euros (about $162 million). The firm hires investor Pierre-Edouard Berion to lead the fund and Lucie Basch, its co-founder Too good to gois to support the fund as a venture partner.
If you’re not familiar with Blisce, the VC firm is based in Paris, has an office in New York, and is best known as its investment vehicle Alexander Aris (image above). Mars is an entrepreneur-turned-philanthropist who built a handful of tech companies in the early 2000s and sold them to big names like Publicis and Blackberry. Blisce raised $240 million (about €225 million) for it last fund.
More recently, Mars launched Blisce, a classic, for-profit VC firm, albeit with a B Corp label. He started too Epica non-profit foundation that funds organizations that reduce child inequality in terms of education or health and supports organizations that fight climate change.
It’s hard to talk about Blisce without mentioning Epic because a portion of Blisce’s profits are reinvested into Epic to cover the foundation’s operating costs. Similarly, the Blisce team is pledging 20% of its equity interest in Epic.
It seems to be working well, especially since Blisce has invested in several unicorns like Spotify, Pinterest and Headspace. More recently, the company has invested in Brut, Sorare and Welcome to the Jungle. As you can see, the company’s portfolio is a mix of consumer technology companies and is not yet focused on climate technology.
With the company’s new fund, Blisce wants to invest in technology startups that have a positive impact on climate change, especially in polluting industries such as materials, food, construction, mobility and energy. The company is going to put together a special team for this fund, and as mentioned above, it has hired Pierre-Edouard Berion to head it.
Berion is a familiar face in Paris VC circles. After working for a few years as an investment manager at Eurazeo (he invested in Zenly, Withings and Vestiaire Collective), he joined Business Growth as a partner.
As for Lucie Basch, she already knows the Blisce team quite well, as the company is an investor in her company, Too Good To Go. He’ll become a venture partner for the new climate fund — in VC lingo, that means he’ll stay at Too Good To Go and help the fund on the side. Blisce is still raising money for her new fund, so it will be interesting to see how much they manage to raise.
