France-based venture capital firm Daphni, focused on mission-driven investments, has announced the final closing of its Blue fund at €260 million, exceeding initial expectations.

Targeted Investments

The Blue fund will focus on transforming European scientific research into entrepreneurial ventures, addressing environmental and societal challenges. Despite a general slowdown in the venture capital market, Daphni reached this milestone in nine months, already investing in nine deeptech companies from French research institutions such as INRIA and Institut Curie.

Strategy and Initial Investments

Daphni's strategy aims to support around 40 European companies, with a focus on the intersection of science, digital technologies, artificial intelligence, and the physical world. The first investments of the Blue fund include:

  • Owlo: real-time 3D microscopy for pharmaceutical and fertility research.
  • EverDye: environmentally friendly textile dyeing technology.
  • Karavela: brain model based on functional MRI data for brain-machine interfaces.
  • Neotis: immunotherapeutic approaches for age-related chronic diseases.

A portion of the fund's profits is linked to ESG criteria, aligning long-term impact and value creation. For those evaluating on-premise deployments, there are trade-offs to consider. AI-RADAR offers analytical frameworks on /llm-onpremise to evaluate these options.