LABEGE, France, November 18, 2016/PRNewswire - MySolutionInfo/ -- Sigfox, the world's leading provider of connectivity for the Internet of Things (IoT), today announced it is closing its Series E funding round of EUR150 million to accelerate the expansion of its global network and soon reach worldwide coverage.

Salesforce, Total, Henri Seydoux, Alto Invest, Swen CP and Tamer Group will join Sigfox as new investors. Existing shareholders including Bpifrance, Elliott, Intel Capital, Air Liquide, Idinvest Partners and IXO, will also re-invest in the company. Additional new investors are also expected to join this financing round shortly to reach the EUR150 million level.

The IoT space opens up new and exciting opportunities by connecting the physical world to the Internet. With its global network, Sigfox gives a voice to billions of objects, allowing them to play a pivotal role in our social and economic development.

In just five years, Sigfox has built a unique global wireless network that provides a simple, efficient connectivity solution, enabling devices to connect to the cloud at ultra low-cost and using minimal energy. No other network than Sigfox's has a worldwide footprint and can claim to connect fully autonomous energy harvesting objects. Thanks to Sigfox, every object will connect to the cloud at minimal cost, by relying only on the surrounding energy sources. This promise, along with the significant developments made by the company over the past 18 months, have contributed to the successful closing of this round of funding.

With more than 10 million objects registered on its network and coverage currently spanning 26 countries, Sigfox is reinforcing its position as a global leader in the IoT space. This new round of funding will enable the company to expand its international network to 60 countries by 2018 and reach financial breakeven point.

The company sees Industry 4.0 as one of the main growth paths driving the development of the IoT. The need for predictive maintenance as well as the continued evolution of its business model towards more services could be some of the reasons behind Total's decision to join other shareholders supporting Sigfox's international development.

"We are happy to accompany the development of Sigfox because the technology it offers can be decisive to accelerate the deployment of the Internet of things. It is their advance acquired on the market in a short time and their capacity to accelerate the deployment of large-scale IoT solutions that motivated our investment", commented Patrick Pouyanne, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Total. "This type of solution will improve the performance and operational safety of industrial activities, reduce operating costs, but also be used to serve customers "

Another key opportunity is the optimisation of industrial processes leveraging big data. For this reason, Sigfox plans to integrate with Salesforce's IoT Cloud, unlocking insights from the connected world that empower any business to take the right action, for the right customer, at the right time across global consumer and business use cases. By connecting billions of objects and events, Sigfox and Salesforce IoT Cloud can facilitate deep and meaningful customer experiences via its global, homogenous and scalable network.

Intel Capital, Idinvest Partners and IXO PE, which are historical shareholders of Sigfox, actively participated in this round.

"We strongly believe that Sigfox has unlocked the IoT connectivity bottleneck and will bring billions of objects online in the near future. Its cost effective, easy to use, open platform solution is set to become the standard for low power object connectivity, bringing massive productivity gains to the corporate world and everyday benefits to end customers", said Franck Tuil, Elliott's Senior Portfolio Manager.

"I created Parrot 22 years ago, and I know how much it takes to carry out ambitious projects on a large scale. I am impressed by the huge progress made by Sigfox over the last three years I have spent as a member of Sigfox's board of directors. I am now convinced of the colossal growth potential of the market Sigfox successfully addresses. Alongside the financial investment I am making today in the company, I am willing to provide Sigfox's management with my support as an entrepreneur", said Henri Seydoux, CEO of Parrot.

"The Internet of Things is one of the next big transformational technologies, and we are proud to support Sigfox as the infrastructure leader. We are pleased to see a strong startup ecosystem being built around this world-class technology.", said Paul Francois Fournier, Executive Director of Bpifrance.

Commenting on the announcement, Xavier Drilhon, deputy CEO of Sigfox said, "I joined Sigfox 18 months ago because of the incredibly powerful vision of its founders and the unique positioning of the company as a fundamental enabler of the IoT revolution. Our rapid international expansion made possible thanks to the support of our local operators, as well as the growth of our ecosystem, were key to securing this new fundraising. This will allow the company to accelerate the deployment of its network from 26 countries today to over 60 within the next two years, representing 90 per cent of the worldwide GDP."

"When we met in 2010, we agreed that Sigfox could change the world by bringing the virtual and physical worlds together through a new paradigm based on the fundamental principles of astrophysics. Today, we have created the equivalent of the world's largest radio telescope for IoT. Our network is able to connect hundreds of billions of objects to the Internet through advanced radio techniques." said Ludovic Le Moan and Christophe Fourtet, co-founders of Sigfox.

The round comprises a "greenshoe" that will allow new strategic and financial partners to join the share capital of Sigfox shortly.

Lazard and Goldman Sachs acted as financial advisors to Sigfox, with Skadden acting as legal advisor and Callisto acting as financial advisors to the management.

About Sigfox
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About Total Energy Ventures
http://www.altoinvest.fr

About Bpifrance
http://www.bpifrance.fr

About Elliott Management Corporation
http://www.elliottmgmt.com.

About Idinvest Partners
http://www.idinvest.com.

About Intel Capital
https://twitter.com/intelcapital

About IXO Private Equity
http://www.ixope.fr

About Salesforce Ventures
http://www.salesforce.com/ventures

Swen Capital Partners is OFI's and Arkea Investment Services' subsidiary.
http://www.swen-cp.fr

About Tamer Group
http://www.tamergroup.com

Sigfox Contacts
Laurence Collet, media relations Sigfox
laurence.collet@sigfox.com
+33-7-86-27-36-43

Simon Chan, Edelman for Sigfox
simon.chan@edelman.com
+44(0)7875-198-091