The provider of a platform enabling companies to connect to their cloud-hosted applications secures an additional €100 million in a Series D led by UK-based Aleph Capital Partners, alongside existing investors Ventech and Open CNP.
Read the article on CFNEWS by R.L., published on February 15, 2022, at 8:32 a.m.
InterCloud has made Europe its playing field, as it set out to do when it raised €22 million in 2019 (see below). The Paris-based connectivity solutions provider now has a presence in Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Germany, Scandinavia, Belgium, and the United Kingdom.
It is in fact a London-based growth fund, Aleph Capital Partners, that is leading the company’s latest financing round, a €100 million Series D for the French SME. The investment firm was founded in 2013 by Frenchman Hugues Lepic, a former member of Goldman Sachs’ merchant banking division, and has previously backed a telecom infrastructure player, namely Interoute, which was acquired by GTT in 2018.
The round is also backed by two existing French investors, Ventech and Open CNP, which first invested in 2017 and 2019, respectively.
Partial exits by existing investors
While the transaction strengthens the company’s financial resources, InterCloud still had sufficient cash on hand. However, the company decided to seize an opportunity.
“For several years, InterCloud had been educating the market about the need for this type of segment,” explains Joy Sioufi, partner at GP Bullhound, which was once again appointed by InterCloud’s management team, including Jérôme Dilouya. “But they began gaining momentum with international clients. During the pandemic, their relationships strengthened, with these large accounts continuing to increase their average spending with InterCloud — in some cases by several hundred thousand euros per year. Cloud usage also grew significantly, particularly among developers.”
Another motivation for InterCloud was to provide liquidity to certain investors who had been shareholders for several years. However, while several business angels fully exited their positions during the third round, that is not the case this time, as all shareholders are remaining in the company’s capital.
Following the fundraising, the management team, which has not held a majority stake for the past five years, remains the company’s largest shareholder group, now alongside Aleph Capital.
M&A Growth Opportunities
InterCloud specializes in multi-cloud architecture orchestration for large enterprises. It has around one hundred major corporate clients across Europe, including Schneider Electric, Veolia, Société Générale, Airbus, and Sodexo.
“The company has developed the ability to create a software layer that connects different types of cloud environments, whether access to public clouds or to companies’ private clouds, with the application layer on top,” explains Joy Sioufi. “They do not store the data, but work with partners such as AWS and OVH.”
InterCloud, which remains tight-lipped about its revenues, estimated by our sources at between €15 million and €25 million, plans to continue investing in “this orchestration phenomenon,” which requires adapting the software layer and enabling the integration of as many APIs as possible.
Another source of growth and development in the coming months will be further international expansion. This ambition could be pursued through acquisitions. Although no specific target is currently being prioritized, InterCloud, which employs more than 100 people, now has sufficient financial resources to seize one or more external growth opportunities.
