Dear friends,

In ten years, we've pioneered a new model of entrepreneurship: the startup studio. What's been key to our success has not been SaaS and our focus on the future of work (although digitalisation in this area has helped), the specific ideas we've launched and the first wireframes we've built (although our product focus has helped). It's been the fact that we've been building in teams. Not solo entrepreneurs in their garage but founders and the support of a now 15 people strong core-team.

In his yearly letter, Thibaud details the concept of team entrepreneurship at eFounders and explains how when we team-up, we go higher than we could have ever imagined.

Reaching milestones as a team 🚀

Behind every fundraising story is a team. A team that works hard prepping, pitching, and announcing it. And a team that works especially hard as the fundraising announcement dissipates and the work really starts. As was the case this summer with Spendesk who raised a Series C round of 100 million euros to bring spend management to every finance team. Or with folk who announced a seed round with no less than 35 angel operators! And again with Swan who raised 16 million euros Series A to democratize access to its banking services across Europe.

Not a fundraising story per se, but one that could not have happened without the A-team that is Crew. They joined YC S21 batch which brings them one step closer to fulfilling their mission of helping every team out there recruit the right way.

Teaming up to grow further 🏔️

As the summer months ended, teams started to get back to the office and collaborate IRL. Front announced that they're opening up new offices in Dublin and Chicago to attract more talent and grow their team even further. And to help with the hybrid transition, the team at Fleex shared a guide with insights from top companies such as Spendesk, Payfit, Back Market, Yousign on how to set up an ideal hybrid mode of working for your team.

The past quarter was also an opportunity to announce new partners, build new features and launch new initiatives. Aircall partnered with Monday.com making Aircall it the first phone app Monday has ever partnered with, Yousign introduced its new signature application for SMBs and Slite added the awaited video covers bringing even more clarity to our new hybrid form of work! We're also really excited about Canyon's recently launched job board for legal jobs in some of the fastest-growing companies.

Building the next batches of teams 🛠️

On our side, we've got our heads down building new projects behind the scenes. We updated our Call for Founders with the ideas we're currently working on (CyberX, PQLX, GTMX, and B2B Payments) and we're actively seeking to partner with exceptional founders to transform them into game-changing businesses. Interested? Hit reply.

We also found a little time to think and reflect. Didier talked design process and culture while Camille chatted all things Logic Founders - our recently launched fintech studio. And Amaury laid down his thoughts on the rise of startups closing seed rounds exclusively with business angels and whether that's a bad thing or not.

If you want to see first-hand what team entrepreneurship is really about, then come build with us! And for those wishing to test some of our new products (and we've got lots of new ones that are just about to become available to a lucky few) then go on and become a pilot!

Talk soon,

The eFounders team