Introducing the Inventory Management OS: Our Investment in Prediko
Felix Capital invests in London-based Prediko’s $5m seed round to build the inventory OS for omni-channel brands
Software has not eaten the world of inventory management … yet
The Power of Data and eCommerce enablement have always been central themes at Felix, combined with Corporate Financial Wellness, since the launch of our third fund, and evident by our recent investments in Juni and Re:cap. We have also seen first-hand through the likes of VanMoof, Mejuri, Anine Bing, Lick and Papier, the important role that demand-planning and inventory management play in ensuring smooth operations and minimising lost revenue.
Omni-channel brands often estimate future sales and production orders using legacy tools or Excel spreadsheets and get their inventory financed in sub-optimal ways. These practices are error-prone, unpredictable and lead to detrimental business outcomes. More than $1 trillion USD is lost every year from inventory distortion and SMEs face more than 40% rejection rate for trade financing. Moreover, new retail models such as live shopping, drops, and more often provide brands with new intelligence on demand planning, but the legacy tools are not able to capture these insights. The Prediko founders observed first hand these challenges and opportunities, and thought there is a role for software to play.
In a similar vein to the likes of Klayvio, Gorgias and Attentive, Prediko is a tool to professionalise back-office eCommerce operations, leveraging software and AI to help brands plan, order and finance their inventory seamlessly and more accurately. They will play a significant role in democratising operational excellence globally by making what was only accessible to the world’s largest companies available to businesses of any size. We are very proud today to be leading Prediko’s $5m seed round.
From consulting to the Techstars program
The company was founded just over a year ago by Youri Moskovic and Nicolas Sabatier who identified the pain point during their three years at Satalia where they developed complex predictive and prescriptive systems for large legacy retailers, such as Tesco and DFS. These bespoke systems cost millions of dollars to build and were extremely complex to implement. Thanks to their field experience, Youri and Nicolas understand extremely well the pain points faced by these merchants, but also the business opportunities that accurate demand forecasting and inventory financing could bring. Shortly after the company’s inception, they were accepted into the Techstars programme and secured a pre-seed round with notable SaaS and fintech founders to hire a team and build an MVP.
They already serve customers like Kimai, or Pia Pia, whose founder Anne Laura Hoefer shared about Prediko: “Since using Prediko we better organise our supply chain; we do not risk being sold out on our bestselling products anymore, keep track of our inventory, and plan future orders accordingly. This increases our sales and reduces excess inventory which is a big win for us.”
Supported and surrounded by experienced software entrepreneurs
Prediko is the latest investment of Zinal Growth, the family office of Guillaume Pousaz, founder and CEO of Checkout.com, joined by HelloWorld (Rodrigo Martinez), and Nomad Capital (Marc McCabe).
It was important for Youri and Nicolas to bring experienced entrepreneurs along this journey — this is why they also secured funding from founders of industry-leading businesses such as Victor Jacobsson from Klarna, Romain Lapeyre from Gorgias, Romain Niccoli from Pigment, Richard Fatal from Zencargo, Pierre-Louis Lacoste from Ankorstore, and Fabrice Haiat from Yoobic.
We look forward to partnering with the Prediko team and this amazing group of business angels and co-investors on this journey to bring best-in-class software and AI to help ecommerce brands and retailers solve the thorniest problems in inventory management.
