Happiness has become the latest venture capital firm to launch a dedicated climate technology fund, for which it plans to raise up to 150 million euros (about $162 million). The firm recruits investor Pierre-Edouard Berion to lead the fund, and Lucie Basch, co-founder of Too good to gowill support the fund as a venture capital partner.
If you're not familiar with Blisce, the venture capital firm is based in Paris, has an office in New York, and is best known as the investment vehicle for Alexander Mars (pictured above). Mars is an entrepreneur turned philanthropist who created a handful of tech companies in the early 2000s and sold them to big names like Publicis and Blackberry. Blisce raised 240 million dollars (around 225 million euros) for its last fund.
More recently, Mars launched Blisce, a classic for-profit venture capital firm, although it carries the B Corp label. He also started Epica non-profit foundation that funds organizations that reduce inequalities among children in education or health, and supports organizations that fight climate change.
It's difficult to talk about Blisce without mentioning Epic, because part of Blisce's profits are reinvested in Epic to cover the foundation's operating costs. Likewise, Team Blisce commits 20% of its stake to Epic.
This seems to have worked well, especially because Blisce has invested in several unicorns such as 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 has 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, particularly in polluting industries like materials, food, construction, mobility and energy. The firm will build a dedicated team for this fund and, as mentioned above, has hired Pierre-Édouard Bérion to direct it.
Berion is a familiar face in Parisian venture capital circles. After working for a few years as investment director at Eurazeo (he invested in Zenly, Withings and Vestiaire Collective), he joined Increase businesses as a partner.
As for Lucie Basch, she already knows the Blisce team quite well, since the company is an investor in her company Too Good To Go. She will become a venture capital partner of the new climate fund – in venture capital jargon, that means she will stay at Too Good To Go and help the fund at the same time. Blisce continues to raise money for their new fund, so it will be interesting to see how much they manage to raise.