Partech-backed French startup Epsor raises €20M; looks to double its 60-person workforce by 2021-end

Paris-based Epsor, a company that designs and distributes employee savings and retirement plans, announced that it has raised €20M in its Series B round of funding led by Gaia Capital Partners. The company claims that the capital raise is the largest ever made by a fintech in the savings sector in France. With this round, Epsor has raised a total of €30M in funding, to date.

Investors to get an overview of the sector

Gaia Capital, which led the round, is a growth equity fund expert in both ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) and asset management, largely due to its partnership with Sycomore Asset Management.

Epsor’s existing investors Partech and BlackFin Capital Partners, also invested in this round. In addition, the round also saw participation from the British listed fund Augmentum Fintech, realising its first investment in France.

With funding from Augmentum Fintech – a fund that specialises in the fintech market, Epsor looks to get a precise overview of the sector at the European level.

Offers employee savings and retirement solutions

According to Epsor, about 50 per cent of employees do not believe they are capable of making independent choices for their investments and four out of ten find employee savings plans difficult to understand. This is where Epsor looks to make a difference. The company claims it is the first to offer a new-generation of employee savings and retirement solutions. 

Founded in 2017 by Julien Niquet and Benjamin Pedrini, Epsor claims to combine technology and proximity to offer tailor-made financial advice to employees and meet their expectations through its robo advisor as well as real financial advisors.

Covering all types of company savings schemes available in France (employee savings plans, collective retirement savings plans, mandatory retirement savings plans), Epsor offers employees personalised advice, as well as an investment profile and tools to suit them and their objectives (security, yield, social and environmental impact, targeting of SMEs, etc.).

Explaining about its services, Benjamin Pedrini, co-founder of Epsor, says, “We support companies that already have employee and retirement savings plans and wish to offer tailor made support and advice to their employees as well as rekindle their motivation. Epsor allows its clients to modernise the approach while placing their employees at the heart of the process. We go beyond a purely transactional approach in order to provide a more personalised experience that allows savers to make the best possible decisions when it comes to financing their life plans.”

Use of the capital

Epsor currently has more than 400 client companies across all sectors (advisory services, industry, financial institutions, distribution etc.) in a market, and serves more than 40,000 savers.

With its strong growth in 2020, the company continues to expand its clients and hence will use the proceeds from this round to address the specific needs of large corporations and accelerate its deployment. 

The company objectives include doubling its 60-person workforce by the end of the year and reaching more than €1B of outstanding collected over the next 12 months.

Julien Niquet, co-founder of Epsor says, “The employee and retirement savings markets in France are huge and continue to grow at a fast pace. Thanks to this significant increase in capital, our aim is to further develop and accelerate our activity within the large corporate sector, relying on our successful track record on the SME market. We are in a strong position to become the partner of choice for hundreds of thousands of employees.”