Posted on Apr 19, 2020, 9:10 p.m.
The problem with the boxes is that you can’t store everything there. The example ofAlan, cataloged as a health insurer since its inception in 2016, is glaring. The French start-up has just completed a new € 50 million financing round with Temasek, the Singaporean sovereign wealth fund which recently acquired a stake in Manomano, and Index Ventures, one of the very first European VCs , bringing its total to 125 million in four years.
In the eyes of professionals in the sector, this amount seems out of step with the 76,000 members that Alan claims today. “Even with the 100,000 members they want to obtain in 2021, they represent only a very small fraction of the market, they do not overshadow anyone”, Olivier Arroua, partner at Sélenis, which also recognizes user experience “Great”. Why, then, first-class investors in Tech do not hesitate to continue to bet big on this nugget cited as an example in the ecosystem of French Tech but which has not yet reached its point of profitability?
Reinventing health
Part of the answer is certainly already in the mouth of its co-founder and CEO, Jean-Charles Samuelian: “Our ambition is to play a fundamental role in society. We are a health company and insurance is part of our offer. But in the end, we think we can become an app that is part of people’s daily lives, which will bring together the elements necessary for the daily management of their health. ” Same story with Brent Hoberman, sponsor of British Tech and one of Alan’s first business angels: “They’re reinventing health, it’s as simple as that. It will probably take a decade to build this story, and profitability is not the most important at the moment. You have to maintain their momentum and attract the best talent. “
A cutting-edge corporate culture
With his 200 employees (250 at the end of 2020), Alan wants to impose a culture that contrasts in the tricolor economy: transparency of wages, telework, decentralized organization … These choices allow him to attract high talent, especially from Silicon Valley ( 15% of the team). A movement that should further intensify with the Covid-19 crisis, which sends many highly qualified employees to the global tech job market.
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Index Ventures, which has supported some of the most beautiful European start-ups, is obviously also convinced, as explained by one of the partners, Jan Hammer: “We have already experienced this in other industries where the giants of the sector, even if they do their job very well, do not see a new entrant arriving who turns everything upside down. We have seen it with Adyen, Robinhood and others… “ But before he can reveal himself to everyone, Alan must grow and broaden his offer. This is the whole purpose of this new fundraiser, underlines Jean-Charles Samuelian: “The health insurance brick is the central pillar of the system, that’s why we started with it. We must continue to grow the team and invest in new subjects. With the crisis we are going through, health will become even more important in businesses and among citizens, and we want to be their partner. “
Multiply services
On the client side, the Parisian nugget has more than 76,000 members and nearly 5,000 companies. Among them, more and more have a large number of employees, which could help it achieve the goal it has set, namely 500,000 members in three or four years. European expansion is another lever to achieve this. The product should be available in Spain and Belgium this summer. But to realize the dream of its founders, Alan must also accelerate the number of services available via its application, which it is working on. Little by little, it links the entire care path: access to telemedicine via a partnership with Livi (Kry); search for health practitioners via Alan Map; site to help members and the general public to better learn about health topics, such as the one implemented for the Covid-19. To enrich the experience, its CEO says he is ready to study all the scenarios: “We always evolve according to this double logic of building partnerships or doing it ourselves if necessary. We have not yet bought a company, but we do not prohibit it. “
To make the health chain really fluid and more efficient, the start-up will also have to tackle the transmission of health documents, another black spot of a system that could be much more efficient thanks to technology. The task is therefore still difficult for the young shoot. “Health is a subject of daily humility”, even admits Jean-Charles Samuelian, but the bundle of weak signals that now surround this flagship of French Tech, notably the emergence of the need for a more efficient health system during the Covid-19 crisis, makes possible the realization of this crazy ambition, which we see more often on the side of Silicon Valley but more and more within France.
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