Sigfox: more than nine representatives settled at the Toulouse Commercial Court
Placed in receivership at the end of January, the Sigfox company based in Labège near Toulouse is attracting covetousness. Nine companies are appearing before the commercial court to take over all or part of the assets of the former star of objects connected to the internet.
Since January 26, the date of placement in receivership of the start-up Sigfox by the Toulouse commercial court, takeover candidates had until Friday, February 25 to submit their takeover offers. The company has just revealed the names of the buyers. Obviously, Sigfox is of interest since nine candidates have submitted an offer for Sigfox SA and seven for Sigfox France SAS.
For Sigfox SA these are Actility, Buffet Investment Services Consortium, Greybull Capital LLP, Heliot Europe Gmbh, Iwire Innovation Management Ltd, OTEIS France, Sentiens, Unabiz and Groupe Zekat . All have formally appointed themselves to the judicial administrators. For Sigfox France SAS, there are seven of the first nine candidates (Greybull Capital LLP, Heliot Europe Gmbh, Iwire Innovation Management Ltd, OTEIS France, Sentiens, Unabiz and Groupe Zekat). “These offers testify to the interest both in Sigfox’s unique technological profile, and in the potential of its markets as well as the quality of its teams,” reacted Sigfox in a statement that seemed to confirm the predictions of the founder of the start. -up, Ludovic Le Moan, who assured La Dépêche that “Sigfox would not stop”.
Takeover candidates with very different profiles
Among the prospective buyers, we find network operators (Heliot Europe, Iwire Innovation Management Ltd, Unabiz), investment funds (Greybull Capital LLP, Buffet Investment Services Consortium) and French companies (OTEIS France, Sentiens, Zekat) specialized in digital technology, information systems or consulting. Heliot had already acquired the German subsidiary of Sigfox in 2020, while Actility is a competitor of Sigfox which uses a different technology (LoRa). Sentiens, specialized in systems and software consulting, was created by a former employee of Sigfox.
250 employees awaiting the name of the buyer
Over the past few weeks, the insolvency administrators will work with Sigfox management and staff representatives on a “rigorous review of the content of these offers and their implications”. A “competitive” dialogue will also engage between the management of Sigfox and the takeover candidates to improve “as much as possible” the proposals in the interest of the company, its employees and its technology. For the moment, nothing has filtered on the number of employees who could be taken over. Sigfox, inventor of the very low speed network called “0 G” has never been laudable since its creation in 2009. It now employs 250 people mainly at the headquarters in Labège near Toulouse.