TheChek News Flow

Krefeld, la structure d’investissement créée par la famille Hermès pour cibler des entreprises non cotées, est en bonne voie de boucler une troisième emplette un an à peine après son lancement. À l’automne 2023, elle avait déjà investi aux côtés de KKR dans le façonnier cosmétique Anjac. Peu après, elle avait officialisé une prochaine prise de participation dans la compagnie d’assurances Albingia. Mais selon nos informations, la holding est aussi en bonne voie d’investir dans Climater, un installateur et réparateur de systèmes de climatisation et de chauffage très présent dans la moitié sud de la France et en région parisienne. Krefeld n’interviendra pas seul, puisque le family office partagera le contrôle de l’entreprise avec le fonds britannique ICG qui entre au capital dans le même temps. La holding CNP, une structure affiliée aux héritiers d’Albert Frère, prendra aussi quelques pourcents, et Sagard restera actionnaire. Quant au binôme de dirigeants, Stéphane Gillet et Marc Trouchaud, il conservera une part importante des parts, suivi par plusieurs centaines de collaborateurs de leur groupe.

Climater est aujourd’hui contrôlé par Cobepa, la holding d’investissement de la famille belge De Spoelberch (actionnaire historique du brasseur AB Inbev). Cette structure est propriétaire du prestataire de génie climatique depuis 2022 et une opération de LBO bouclée pour un montant de 350 millions d’euros. Selon une source, l’arrivée de Krefeld et d’ICG fera décoller la valorisation du groupe à près de 750 millions d’euros. Cette progression suit la croissance de son Ebitda, qui ressortirait actuellement à environ 65 millions d’euros contre un peu moins de 30 millions d’euros juste avant l’arrivée de Cobepa. La nouvelle opération de LBO reposera sur un financement bancaire mis en place par Crédit Agricole CIB. Edmond de Rothschild, Eight Advisory et Kearney ont épaulé la direction de Climater dans la préparation de cette opération.

Concurrent de Spie et d’Equans (filiale de Bouygues), Climater intervient à 70 % sur des projets de rénovation et travaille autant pour les milieux industriels que les logements sociaux. A titre d’exemple, il intervient historiquement sur des sites d’Airbus ou de Pierre Fabre nécessitant d’être maintenus sous température dirigée. « Le succès de cette entreprise repose sur sa capacité à prioriser son implantation sur des bassins d’emplois jouissant d’une certaine croissance démographique, même légère, souffle un connaisseur de l’entreprise. C’est là que les besoins en infrastructures sont les plus solides, et cela représente autant d’opportunités de contrats. » Le prestataire bénéficie par ailleurs du durcissement de la réglementation en matière de performance énergétique. Climater est surtout présent dans l’Hexagone mais le groupe a profité de ces dernières années pour s’implanter sur le marché canadien et envisage aujourd’hui de s’attaquer aux pays limitrophes de la France, notamment la Belgique, l’Allemagne et l’ Italie. Il ambitionne par ailleurs de se développer dans le domaine de la protection incendie (où il a réalisé une petite acquisition en 2024) et dans le génie électrique.

Five-year-old Wiz, a $16 billion–valuation startup that sells cloud cybersecurity software to large companies, has always had a flair for the dramatic. A few years ago, CEO Assaf Rappaport declared it the fastest-growing software company ever. In 2023, it openly mulled a takeover of larger, publicly held SentinelOne. And last year Wiz told its employees it was turning down a $23 billion acquisition offer from Alphabet—a rich offer to reject.

So maybe that’s why Wiz’s appointment Thursday of a chief financial officer with an unusual Hollywood-focused background feels fitting for one of the most closely watched private tech firms. Tel Aviv–based Wiz plucked Fazal Merchant out of a snowboarding-filled, Utah-based retirement, after a monthslong effort to find the right person for the job. Merchant, who has worked in various finance roles at investment banks, DirecTV and once-hot cybersecurity startup Tanium, also was CFO at Jeffrey Katzenberg’s DreamWorks.

In a phone interview Wednesday, Merchant, who is 51, acknowledged his unusual path. “If you look at my background, some would describe peculiar experiences. Maybe I’m struggling with professional ADD, I’m not sure,” he said, adding that he had been “living his best life” in retirement and wasn’t looking for a new gig when he connected with Wiz last year.

He said he was drawn to the company’s potential and will spend significant time at its U.S. outpost in New York. A big part of his job will be helping Wiz prepare for an initial public offering within the next year or so—a duty he’s never taken on before. “This team’s already broken records and milestones and [had] blinding growth,” he said.

Wiz also has been more blindingly candid about its IPO ambitions than most startups. Executives have said the company hopes to hit about $1 billion in annual recurring revenue before going public within the next year or so. Merchant said the number was “ambitious” but the company had “good visibility to [it].”

That target implies high growth, given that I’ve heard Wiz expects to finish this fiscal year, which ends this month, with more than $600 million in ARR. Another potential issue for IPO investors: The company still burns cash, although it’s unclear exactly how much. (A Wiz spokesperson declined to comment.)

On the positive side: Investors tend to like how many big company clients Wiz has managed to snag (45% of the Fortune 100, its website declares), and how much customers have continued to spend.

Still, Merchant’s hiring is an important puzzle piece in the late-2025 and 2026 venture-backed IPO slate. By my count, Wiz was one of the last major venture capital–backed IPO contenders without a CFO, after software firm Canva and artificial intelligence infrastructure startup Vast Data made their own appointments in recent months. Navan and CoreWeave, both of which are expected to go public this year, made their CFO hires last year, too.

Having a CFO is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a company to go public. Wiz will need to be sure it can confidently forecast to investors how fast it will grow each quarter, which is “challenging at this scale and this stage of growth,” Merchant said.

“I have a fair bit of work to do in terms of operations side—systems, governance, processes, controls,” Merchant added. “None of that is rocket science.”

An IPO, of course, is in part about storytelling, not just hard, cold numbers. Cybersecurity companies in particular care deeply about perception. Wiz has been more than capable of weaving a tale to private investors and the press for why it will be an important company. Soon it will have to tell that story to a bigger crowd.

Flagship AI chatbot was previously only available to X users

Elon Musk’s artificial-intelligence startup, xAI, launched its first stand-alone consumer app, its latest step as the company tries to catch up with more established players such as OpenAI and Google in the generative AI race.

The app is called Grok, which is also the name of the AI language model developed by xAI. Users noticed the app in Apple’s App Store early Thursday.

Previously, users could only access the Grok chatbot, xAI’s flagship product, through X, the social-media platform also run by Musk.

On Thursday, users were able to start using the new Grok app for free. There didn’t appear to be a subscription option in the version viewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Through the X platform, xAI rolled out a free version of the Grok chatbot last month, though the company said that X users who pay for Premium and Premium+ subscriptions would get higher usage limits.

The description in Apple’s App Store suggested the app was an early “beta” product and that it was being introduced to the U.S. “Introducing Grok Beta for iOS: get access to xAI’s latest model, Grok 2, for free,” it said.

Musk has declared xAI will create a less politically correct AI and has criticized competitors for being too “woke.” He has also sought to distinguish Grok by saying it has the advantage of access to up-to-date information via the X platform.

“Launching a stand-alone app gives it a chance to build a broader audience, beyond X users,” said Meghana Dhar, a former Snap and Instagram executive who is now a tech adviser.

While introducing a stand-alone app could also draw users away from X, Dhar said she didn’t think that was a major concern.

“I think there’s more stickiness to X users than that,” she said. “X users are very loyal to the platform.”

Musk launched xAI in 2023 to compete with OpenAI, the ChatGPT developer he co-founded but later left after a power struggle. Musk raced to recruit talent, raise billions of dollars from investors, and build a massive data center in Memphis, Tenn., to turn xAI into a competitive player in the AI industry.

xAI introduced the first version of its Grok chatbot four months after publicly launching the company in July 2023 and has released updated versions since.

The company has been working on other ways to generate revenue. Late last year, xAI released a paid tool developers can use to build products using Grok, offering discounts for early users.

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