Axeleo Capital, a venture arm of the French startup accelerator Axeleo, has announced its second fund, aiming to invest €50 million in seed-stage proptech startups across Europe. So far PropTech 1 has seen a first close at €35 million.

“This project is a response to the strong momentum affecting the European property market.Driven by demographic and environmental pressures and a social paradigm shift, real estatemust become more productive, frugal and sustainable, and this will necessarily requireinnovation,” said Mathias Flattin, partner at Axeleo Capital.

“Proptech is an industry that sits at the crossroads of digital technologies and traditional trades and which has not yet been very receptive to innovation: 0.1 percent of the added value invested in R&D, i.e. 24 times less than the average of the other sectors,” explains Axeleo co-founder Eric Burdier, citing statistics from Ernst & Young.

From July 2017 to about a year ago, the French firm has been investing from its first fund, which went to European B2B startups in artificial intelligence, IoT and cybersecurity. Now with €80 million under management, the VC’s portfolio includes Alsid, Jenji, Joko, 365 Talents, Hyperlex or Trustpair. The team of nine is based in Lyon and Paris, and led by Burdier and Mathieu Viallard, the managing director.

LPs of PropTech I include Banque des Territoires, international corporates and financial institutions (RTE, Vinci Energies, Allianz France and Groupe VYV), the Île-de-France Region and some family offices.