Switzerland’s fastest-growing AI company Unit8 welcomes Sagard NewGen as an investor, to accelerate its next phases of growth
(Paris/Lausanne) Unit8 and Sagard NewGen announce an investment by Sagard NewGen in Unit8 to accelerate its next phases of growth. Sagard NewGen becomes a minority shareholder in Unit8 to help fulfill a vision shared with Unit8 management to build a leading European data, analytics, and AI consulting firm.
Founded in 2017, Unit8 is a leading Swiss data services company with a mission to help its clients turn data into value with a mix of data science, analytics, and AI. Unit8 operates at the intersection of technology and business to accompany its customers at every step of their data & AI journey by offering end to end portfolio of services (Consulting & Strategic Advisory, Data & AI Solutions, Data & AI Platforms, Data Operations and MLOps).
Unit8 is a trusted partner to 25+ international large-cap clients based in Europe and North America, including Daimler, Firmenich, Merck, and WWF; Unit8 has a positive track record of having delivered over 125 data & AI projects. In 2022, the company was recognised as the “Fastest Growing Firm” in Switzerland by the Financial Times.
Unit8 has developed strong technical expertise in the data and analytics domain and a deep ecosystem of partnerships with leading global companies, including Microsoft, Palantir, Dataiku, and AWS. Unit8 was awarded Microsoft’s Partner of the Year award in Switzerland in the Data & AI category. Unit8 has also been one of the first certified Palantir’s partners in the EMEA region.
The company has also been renowned for its pro bono activities and open-source community contributions. Unit8 is recognized by thousands of users of Darts, an open-source time series forecasting library, built by Unit8's engineering team and endorsed worldwide by the data science community.
Unit8’s management and Sagard NewGen share the ambition to build a leading European data, analytics and AI consulting firm, leveraging the strong technical skills of Unit8 team, delivery excellence, and the company’s track record in the fast-growing data, analytics and AI market.
Sagard NewGen supports the development of leaders in the Technology and Healthcare sectors. It finances the growth strategy of profitable European companies with revenues of up to €150 million through both majority and minority equity investments. The companies it invests in share its commitment to innovation and sustainability.
Dr. Marcin Pietrzyk, CEO and Co-Founder says, “Following five years of strong growth, we are delighted to welcome Sagard NewGen as a partner for the new phase in Unit8’s development. We remain committed to our joint vision of establishing a leading data, analytics, and AI company in Europe. While doing so, we will accelerate the scaling of the company by further structuring our portfolio, we will push to hire the best talent and we want to advance our international growth. Michal Rachtan, CTO and Co-Founder, adds “ At the same time, we will keep what makes us unique - our DNA and company culture while delivering the best quality services, and keeping an absolute commitment to our clients. We are very excited to pursue our mission with Sagard NewGen to help our clients turn data into value with a mix of data science, advanced analytics and AI.”
Guillaume Lefebvre, Partner at Sagard NewGen says: “We are very proud to partner with Unit8’s outstanding management team in this new development phase. Sagard will put all of its resources at the company’s disposal, leveraging our expertise in supporting tech companies, our deep ecosystem in AI/ML, and our strong commercial network, to bolster Unit8’s organic growth internationally. Agnès Huyghues Despointes, Partner at Sagard NewGen adds, “We are eager to actively support the company and to work alongside Dr. Marcin Pietrzyk, Michal Rachtan, and their management team.”
Press contacts
Unit8: Brigitte Kaps, mail@rentapr.ch, Mob +41 79 289 2042
Sagard NewGen:
France and Europe: Havas Paris, Mael Evin - mael.evin@havas.com, +33 6 44 12 14 91
Switzerland: Hirzel.Neef.Schmid.Conseillers, Marie-Hélène Hancock - marie-helene.hancock@konsulenten.ch, +41 22 340 28 45
Parties involved in the transaction
Unit8: Dr Marcin Pietrzyk, Michal Rachtan
Sagard NewGen: Guillaume Lefebvre, Agnès Huyghues Despointes, Jan Kinsky, Martin Klotz
Unit8’s advisors
Corporate finance advisor: Houlihan Lokey (Malte Abrams, Sara Napolitano, Camille Gay, Christie Adams)
Legal advisors: NKF (Philip Spoerlé, Andrea Giger, Katalin Siklosi, Julia Tolstova)
Tax advisors: Deloitte (Reto Gerber, Sabrina Herren, Arber Gashi)
Sagard NewGen’s advisors
Corporate lawyers: Paul Hastings (Olivier Deren, Charlotte Dupont) and Walder Wyss (Stefan Knobloch, Dario Galli)
Tax lawyers: Paul Hastings (Allard de Waal, Alban Castarede) and Walder Wyss (Maurus Winzap, Janine Corti)
Financing lawyer: Walder Wyss (Lukas Wyss)
Legal, tax, social BDD: Walder Wyss (Stefan Knobloch, Maurus Winzap, Dario Galli, Janine Corti)
Strategic BDD: Kearney (Jérôme Souied, Hadi Benkirane, Sven Garrels, Tim Biermann, Luc Lepage, Luca Serratore)
Financial BDD: PwC (Philippe Serzec, Mathieu Gravier)
About Unit8
Founded in 2017 by Dr. Marcin Pietrzyk and Michal Rachtan, Unit8 is a leading Swiss data and analytics consulting firm with a mission to help its clients turn data into value with a mix of data science, analytics and AI. Unit8 operates at the intersection of technology and business to accompany its customers at every step of their data & AI journey by offering end-to-end services. In 2022, the company was named “Fastest Growing Firm” in Switzerland by the Financial Times. Headquartered in Lausanne and with offices in Zürich, Bern, Kraków and Wroclaw (Poland), the company currently employs 110+ data experts and partners with some of the most prestigious global providers such as Palantir, Microsoft, and AWS. Unit8’s track record includes the delivery of more than 125 data & AI projects to date, and its customer portfolio consists of international blue-chip logos across a variety of industries (examples include Daimler, Firmenich, Merck and more). More information: https://unit8.com/
About Sagard NewGen
Sagard NewGen supports the development of leaders in the Technology and Healthcare sectors. We finance the growth strategy of profitable European companies with revenues of up to €150 million through both majority and minority equity investments. The companies we invest in share our commitment to innovation and sustainability. Sagard NewGen is a member of the international Sagard platform with $14 billion of Asset Under Management, combining capital, culture, and network to grow businesses and drive strategic and financial success. As such, Sagard NewGen provides management teams with the bespoke support and a high-value-added ecosystem with international reach through Sagard’s presence in Paris, London, Montreal, Toronto, New York, San Francisco and Singapore. More information: https://newgen.sagard.eu/en/
