Start-ups: creating value together

Fully committed to urban transformation, Icade has developed an open innovation strategy with start-ups aimed at testing new concepts in a more agile way to later ramp up their implementation on a larger scale. The goal is to combine the agility of a start-up and the firepower of the Icade Group to implement solutions on a large scale in response to the challenges facing cities and the real estate industry.

A facilitator for collaboration

In order to unearth promising start-ups, Icade has made a habit of forging partnerships with incubators such as Paris&Co, H7, etc. The goal is to create value together in line with Icade’s business activities.

For start-ups interested in working with Icade, the team in charge of innovation is an excellent stepping stone. Its role is to be a sounding board for the value propositions of innovations... and to put the start-ups in contact with the right people at Icade. Attentive to the needs of those on the ground and Icade’s business lines while constantly on the lookout for new solutions, the team is an interface between the world of start-ups, which it knows so well, and the Group.

Bespoke structure and support

So much more than a mere facilitator, the team also organises workshops and coaching sessions to together define the key aspects of successful collaboration. In addition, Icade can count on its actively involved legal teams to create winning business partnerships through appropriate processes.

Depending on the start-up’s stage of maturity, collaboration may be fostered in a variety of ways.

From proof of concept to the investment

For start-ups having sufficiently mature solutions, Icade can swiftly integrate them into its activities by:

Making its business parks available as full-scale testing grounds, in addition to providing business support services and co-financing the proofs of concept
Integrating them directly into our solutions or our bids in tendering processes, for innovative urban development
Investing directly in a project

In just a few years, many partnerships have been forged, giving rise to more than thirty innovation contracts.

Are you a startup working on a project that you think we might be interested in?

Contact us to discuss the opportunities for co-innovation.

Get in touch

Urban Odyssey: co-creating start-ups with Icade

For entrepreneurs who are still in the early stages of their project: Icade created Urban Odyssey, the 1^st start-up studio dedicated to shaping the cities of tomorrow and real estate. Co-creating a start-up with Icade from the project’s early phase makes it possible to enhance its value and implementability. As a result, “entrepreneurs in residence” at Urban Odyssey benefit from incubation (in partnership with the HEC Incubator), pre-seed funding and direct access to Icade’s business lines.

After an initial pre-seed phase and validation of the product-market fit, which can last from 6 to 9 months, Icade and the entrepreneur can together decide whether to ramp up the project, which would give rise to a second round of seed funding.

Are you an entrepreneur or a new start-up interested in growing alongside Icade?

Let's meet!

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Grow Up sows the seeds of creativity

Founded in 2015, Grow Up is the first incubator dedicated to startups specialising in the property and urban services sector to be fully funded by a private stakeholder. At Grow Up, Icade supports young companies such as Ngine Networks, which has developed a dynamic display system. This allows building occupants to receive real-time information on the management of – and on life at – their workplace. The startup installs screens in buildings owned by Icade, including Open, its headquarters. Ecov, another startup, has designed a short-distance car-sharing solution for everyday journeys. This locally focused service offers smart car-sharing stations and a social network to put drivers and passengers in touch with one another.

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Connecting with Deepki to optimise consumption

How can CSR reports be easily generated while also improving their reliability? To tackle this issue, the Services Properties teams got in touch with the startup Deepki. Together, they successfully completed an in-depth transformation of Icade sites’ energy performance monitoring. Collection of consumption data from shared and private areas now takes place automatically, making data collection faster and more reliable. Icade and its tenants now have a clear vision of their consumption and can redouble their efforts to reduce it.