Editor’s note: This is a sponsored article, which means it is independently written by our editorial team but financially supported by another organisation, in this case, Relevation. If you would like to learn more about sponsored posts on tech.eu, read this and contact us if you are interested in partnering with us.
Proptech Lab, a community of innovators in the real estate value chain, has announced the second edition of its Relevation conference to take place on June 23—24. The online event is expected to double in size from the 2020 gathering, bringing together over 400 startup founders looking for funding, more than 200 VCs working in the field, and some 50 limited partners looking to allocate their capital in proptech funds.
The 2021 agenda includes a pitch session, where GPs raising capital will engage with LPs willing to allocate their capital in a proptech fund. It is also aimed to attract high potential and young graduates, with participants from Yale, Oxford, Stanford, IESE Barcelona and other world-class universities. Registration started on March 1st, and the list of attendees already includes startups raising almost $200 million, VCs representing $912 million to be invested, and LPs with a total of some $2.7 billion under management.
A vertical-defining event
Founded by Idriss Goossens in 2020, the Relevation event was created as the pandemic greatly accelerated the adoption of proptech, and the need arose for a digital solution to connect startups and investors. This global digital fundraising summit will be attended by the most active VCs including A/O Proptech, Round Hill Ventures, Camber Creek, Taronga Ventures, Greensoil Capital, Aconterra Capital, Foundamental, tech giants including Microsoft, Zalando, Procore Technologies, real estate corporations like Hilti, Aliaxis, BESIX and hundreds of the hottest startups in the industry.
“We are not organizing an educational event, like a webinar,” said Goossens. “Relevation Is a transactional event, which means our purpose is matchmaking — between founders and VCs, between VCs and LPs, between founders and M&A partners. Although I love physical events, I think digital events are much more efficient when it comes to transactions, because digital offers much more opportunities: it is global, so the pipe is huge for the attendees, and we have an algorithm matching them directly with the most relevant people to engage with, and they don’t waste time engaging with less relevant people.
“We started as a two-day event, but our ambition is to become the reference point in the proptech venture capitalism, to contribute to define the sector’s standard, so we will produce a number of exclusive reports (exit best practices, investment readiness guide, valuations and multiples, performances, investment trends, etc.) that will be made available for the attendees. In order to accelerate our global growth, we recently closed an investment round led by CREtech.”
With over ten years of experience in the proptech space, Goossens is also the founder of PropTech Lab, a real estate innovators network in Belgium representing 175 company members. PropTech Lab helps startups raise capital and advises large real estate corporations on their innovation strategy. In 2019, Goossens co-founded the European PropTech Association, organising the PropTech StartUp & Scale-Up Europe Awards. European PropTech Association is supported by the European Commission and by the 26 national proptech hubs, representing 3,000 PropTech startups.
The industry view
After a relatively quiet year in 2020, the proptech industry is set to break funding records in 2021 — and Relevation is looking to facilitate and support the growth trend.
“Funding in EU proptech has been growing at 100 percent YoY since 2014, but it dropped down from €3 billion in 2019 to €1.2 billion in 2020 due to the unprecedented pandemic and the uncertainties in the global economy,” said Idriss Goossens, founder of Proptech Lab and Relevation.
“Generally speaking, VCs became more prudent managers, and started focussing more on supporting their portfolio companies. Nonetheless we think 2021 will be a record-breaking year in terms of volume of capital deployed in the proptech space. Firstly, COVID-19 had a very positive impact on proptech, it accelerated tremendously the adoption of proptech; secondly, this year started very strong, with €1.08 billion already invested across Europe.”
Sneak peek into the Relevation 2021 agenda
The conference will take place across four virtual stages, with keynotes by over 70 top league speakers from the industry. Among them is Gregory Dewerpe, founder of A/O PropTech, the largest proptech fund of Europe with €250 million under management. A seasoned real estate and technology investor with over 15 years of experience, he will share his insights on the intersection of banking, real estate and VC ecosystems.
Another notable speaker is Brad Greiwe, co-founder and managing partner at Fifth Wall, the largest proptech fund of the world with $1 billion to invest. Prior to starting Fifth Wall, Brad co-founded Invitation Homes, a multi-billion-dollar owner and operator of single-family rental properties originally backed by The Blackstone Group. As CTO, he had developed a proprietary technology stack to support the valuation, acquisition, rehabilitation, leasing, and professional management of over 80,000 homes in 17 major markets, serving 120,000 residents across the U.S.
Here are some key insights of the event:
- 70+ top-league speakers from all around the world
- 32+ conferences on four different stages over the two days
- 1,200+ introduction meetings between startup founders and investors
- 400+ proptech startup founders raising capital, from pre-revenue to growth stage
- 200+ VCs, BAs, PEs, CVCs
- 50+ LPs willing to allocate their capital to a proptech fund
- 100+ high-potential specialists and young graduates looking for a new challenge
Come join the speakers, founders, VCs, and industry professionals at this year's Relevation. Visit relevation.org to secure a ticket today!
Image credit: Florian Wehde on Unsplash
Would you like to write the first comment?
Login to post comments