Sifted - The actors who'd play founders

Good morning there,

It started when we noticed the uncanny likeness between Revolut founder Nikolay Storonsky and Succession actor Jeremy Strong. It spiralled into a lost afternoon in the Sifted office, casting Hollywood actors to play European tech founders… a movie which is (sadly) probably not coming to a theatre near you anytime soon. 

Scroll on for our casting picks — we’re particularly proud of who we’ve got lined up for everyone’s favourite VC and podcaster, Harry Stebbings.

Elsewhere today:

• First ‘project Vinted’, then ‘project kids’: What’s next for Milda Mitkute, Vinted’s cofounder?
• Almost two thirds of startup employees say managers are unprepared to take on the role 

— Freya Pratty, senior reporter

/A message from our sponsor Remote

Reduce costs - and administrative burdens

Consolidate your payroll, benefits, compliance and more into a single, streamlined HR solution from Remote.com. Reduce costs and administrative burdens, simplify complex processes and free up your time to focus on growth.

🇫🇷 After 51 days of political limbo following the surprise outcome of France’s snap parliamentary election, in which no party secured a majority, president Emmanuel Macron has appointed former Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier as the country’s next prime minister. He will be tasked with forming a new government.

• Usually quieter when it comes to politics, the French tech sector had vocally defended the need to stay clear of “extremes” in the run-up to the election, and expressed concern at the uncertainty caused by the results. All eyes will now be on who Barnier chooses to govern the country — and how it might affect startups. 

Billionaires’ body scans

Earlier this week, I visited one of Paris’ few longevity clinics — and the only one that describes itself as a tech startup. 

Hidden behind an unassuming Haussmannian door, just a few minutes away from the Paris Opera, the centre has been operating for nine months. The startup behind it, Zoï, promises customers a “360-degree check-up’ — a three-hour series of tests and exams, ranging from blood tests to eye scans through spirometry and gut microbiome analyses. 

The objective? Collect data on up to 200 biomarkers that are in turn analysed by an AI model, in order to deliver lifestyle recommendations that, promises Zoï, will prevent disease and improve customers’ long-term wellness.

“It’s not about adding years of life,” says Zoï cofounder — and former special advisor to French president Emmanuel Macron — Ismaël Emelien. “The goal is to learn the body’s ‘user manual’ to prevent illnesses and enable people to live in good health for longer.”

It’s not for everyone. Membership to Zoï is €3.6k per year, which includes an annual checkup as well as the follow-up recommendations. That’s roughly the cost of a membership to Soho House, says cofounder Antoine Attali — and Zoï’s customers usually belong to the same social circles.

The clinic caters to premium needs, from snacks elaborated by world-famous chef Alain Ducasse to a balneotherapy section modelled on ‘Japanese thermal baths‘, featuring a snow cabin (?) and a mineral bath that is, I am told, “twice as salty as the Dead Sea”. 

Attali tells me that in the long-term, Zoï hopes to become accessible to everyone, and that prices will go down to a similar level to your average WiFi bill. 

For now, though, preventative health remains a hobby of the upper-class. In fact, Zoï’s investors are all private individuals; the company’s €20m seed round, which it raised in 2022, included a good number of high-profile billionaires such as Xavier Niel, Rodolphe Saadé and Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel.

And Zoï is not the only longevity startup appealing to the ultra-rich. Spotify founder Daniel Ek is behind similar ventures, including Sand Clinic in Stockholm, where customers can receive full body check-ups and treatments ranging from vacuum therapy to red light saunas — with membership expected to cost between €1,000 and €10,000 a month. 

Ek is also the founder of healthtech Neko Health, which has built a full-body scanner for health data collection that it says helps doctors detect potential diseases earlier. The company has a clinic in Stockholm and has just opened a new spot in London, right in the middle of Marylebone, where it prices a one-hour scan at £299 — almost double the price of a visit to the Stockholm clinic when it opened in 2023 (€180).

Despite the cost, the proposition seems appealing enough. Neko Health says it already has a waiting list of 22k people; Zoï says it has “around 1k members” to date and is currently carrying out a dozen check-ups per day — but the startup is confident that it can ramp up to reach its maximum capacity of 35k annual check-ups in the next five years.

Whether or not the preventative treatments promised by startups like Zoï, Neko Health and Sand Clinic will ever reach the masses remains to be seen; what seems certain for now is that billionaires won’t get tired of full-body-scanning anytime soon.

— Daphné Leprince-Ringuet, reporter

What makes Middle Eastern investors tick?

Gulf investors poured $3bn into European startups last year. Fancy a piece of the action? Unsure where to start? Join our upcoming virtual Sifted Talks to hear how to get in front of and impress the leading firms.

🎥 Dream casting: the actors we want to see play Europe’s top founders 

💁‍♀️ Few people know that Vinted, the Lithuanian-founded secondhand clothes marketplace used by customers across 22 markets, was started by a woman. Her name is Milda Mitkute, and she had the idea back in 2008, as a 21-year-old student.

• The reason for that is simple — and familiar for so many women who are struggling to combine motherhood and careers: in 2016, before the company hit unicorn status, Mitkute decided to start a family.
• Now she's back, building a new startup. Zosia Wanat finds out more.

What’s behind the rise in secondaries — and how could it affect founders? (sponsored by Latham & Watkins)

Startup managers often get a bad rep for being too inexperienced, chaotic or micromanaging — for a reason. We recently surveyed Sifted readers who work at startups to find out what they make of their bosses...

• 63% of respondents said that only a minority of the managers they've had at startups were prepared to take on the role, with some reporting that their managers were poor communicators, or simply do not know how to lead.
• Just 4.5% of respondents feel their managers across the board have set them clear goals; 54% said a minority of their managers have done so.
• Career development is also a biggie: only 9% of respondents said their managers at startups helped them develop their careers.

Read the full findings here.

Augsburg-based Reonic, a German startup which provides a SaaS solution to support installers and sellers integrating renewable technologies into households and businesses, has raised a €13m Series A led by Northzone, with participation from existing investors Point Nine and Puzzle Ventures. 

•  This is Northzone’s second investment in a SaaS climate tech solution in the last month. 

Paris-based Entalpic, which develops AI-driven materials discovery, has raised €8.5m in seed funding. The round was led by Paris-based VC Breega with the participation of San Francisco-based VCs Cathay Innovation and Felicis. The startup was founded earlier this year by Owkin alumni. 

• It’s predicted that GenAI might be able to simplify and decrease the time it takes for new materials to go from discovery to market, as it has with drug discovery.

Brussels-based Cowboy, an e-bike manufacturer, has raised €5m in a funding round led by Asian VC Cypress Capital. Existing investors Index Ventures, Hardware Club, Future Positive Capital, Isomer and Exor also participated in the round. With its new backer’s strong ties to Taiwan’s bicycle manufacturing hub, the startup hopes to strengthen its global supply chain and aims for profitability by 2025.

Helsinki-based Root Signals, which helps businesses control and monitor GenAI applications, has raised €2.5m in funding. The round was led by London-based Angular Ventures, with participation from Business Finland.

London-based Capsa AI, which is focused on transforming due diligence for private equity firms, has raised €2m in seed funding. The round was led by Outward VC with participation from Cornerstone VC, Antler and angel investors including Chris Adelsbach.

If you’d like to submit a deal, get in touch. 

For more deals, analysis and M&A insight, become a Pro subscriber to receive our weekly Deals newsletter.

• Sign up to our specialist newsletters if you want more on fintech, climate tech, startup life and VC.
• Tune in to Sifted’s podcast, Startup Europe.
• Join the Sifted team along with 3,000+ startups, founders and investors at Sifted Summit this October. Get your ticket now!