Working together to take-over the French market: A success story with our partner WSC Sports
As we had previously shared in our Transacting in the French market: the do’s and don’ts Israeli startups should have in mind before getting started article, working with the European market as a non-European actor is not easy. It takes several key ingredients mixed together to succeed — from getting in touch with the right person within the target organization, obtaining the actual business introduction, to being offered a concrete POC opportunity and obtaining a clear contract signature.
We believe cultural proximity to be one of these key ingredients. From our experiences over the years, we’ve observed that in order to build and foster a real business opportunity with a French player (especially a market leader in their industry), being introduced by someone who is European, from the local market, who knows and who speaks the cultural business language, is deal-changing.
And luckily, that’s our case at Maor. As an Israeli VC fund co-founded by two former French bankers very familiar with the French business ecosystem, and with the active support of our European LPs, we root our unique value proposition on that key cultural advantage. Our mission is to actively bring closer the Israeli tech expertise to the European business ecosystem: we do so by always seeking new ways to provide additional value through our proactive business development initiatives in Europe.
Highly qualified Business Introductions
Since we were established in 2018, we have actively secured dozens of opportunities in France for our startups. Concretely, our strength relies on our powerful relationship with our investors, our unique business network, our team’s international presence and agility (with members based in Israel close to our startups but also in Paris, where business partners, investors and targets are), and our collaborative way of working with the business development teams at our portfolio startups.
And we’re proud to say that numbers speak for themselves: we’ve been constantly securing at least one introduction per week. When we talk about introductions, we’re not referring just to generic cold emails where a corporation and a portfolio company are both copied. We’re actually referring to highly qualified interactions where we have been able to reach the relevant contact at the target company, provide a first high-level pitch of the startup solution, share their sales collateral, nurture interest, and obtain the ask for a proper introduction from the target itself. As such, these kinds of intros have an extremely high conversion rate to a follow-up meeting with the portfolio company’s sales team, which in turn is also highly likely to convert to some sort of POC or a more in-depth discussion.
Collaboration and visibility
Collaboration and visibility are at the heart of our business development operating mode. We take pride in making the startups we invest in highly visible and accessible, both to our limited partners and to our wide network of partners in France. Our aim is to maintain a strong and active level of awareness of the startups’ activities to facilitate growth opportunities. This is achieved through collaboration, which is closely linked to our agile working methods established with the startups and business partners.
Twice a year, we co-create a targeted list of business development opportunities with the startup, considering their commercial capabilities, market research, and our proximity to the target. This list is informed by our knowledge of the target’s financial dynamics, strategic priorities, and our ability to connect the startup with the right contacts.
WSC Sports — Maor’s Partner for 4 Years
As a new year begins, we’re grateful to reflect on one of our key business success stories from the past few years: our unique collaboration with the WSC Sports Business Development and leadership teams, which led to securing several key new deals in France for WSC Sports.
WSC Sports has developed a unique platform that generates personalized sports videos adapted to every digital platform and every sports fan — automatically and in real-time. Their advanced AI technology is being utilized by more than 300 leading sports organizations, media rights owners and broadcasters, including the NBA, the NHL, Warner Media, Discovery, ESPN, YouTubeTV. No other competitor can do what the WSC Sports platform can do (not at their speed, not at their scale, not with their quality) and as such the company is repeatedly recognized by industry awards around the world.
Since the start of our collaboration in 2019, shortly after joining WSC Sports’ funding round at the time, we have been dedicated to showcasing our value by generating business opportunities for WSC Sports in France. With the help of our network, we have successfully arranged several business introductions to prominent French media and sports companies, which were key targets for WSC Sports. Over the past few years, we have continued to build on this success.
A first French contract jointly won in 2022
In 2020, the world shut down due to Covid and so did the entire sports industry and specifically, live games. But that didn’t stop WSC Sports from coming up with a brilliant solution that would ensure its clients were able to continue to deliver video content to their fans all around the world. This was achieved by adapting WSC Sports’ live game technology to work on video archives, effectively providing clients with limitless content from the past, to help fill the void until the live action returned.
WSC Sports’ dedication to their partners during this period, led to a strategic business decision to offer this archive solution after the Covid period. Just think about it — what if, in addition to sharing the best highlights from recent games, rights holders could also share highlights of defining moments from years gone by? Wouldn’t sports fans love to see classic content from the archives even when live games are back? Wouldn’t content teams love to have this historical footage, often hidden away in inaccessible video libraries, easily available in a few clicks of a button? Unsurprisingly, WSC Sports’ bet was spot-on.
With WSC Sports’ AI technology unlocking content treasure troves around the world, it gave us a fantastic excuse to (re)connect with contacts in France and introduce this richer, and even more advanced solution, that offered a 360 approach to content monetization and fan engagement. We worked directly with the WSC Sports Business Development Team for months to re-engage with targets, obtain business introductions and demos, and launch POCs. The WSC Sports team was incredibly well prepared for each discussion, mastering the strategy, potential business scope and current and future competitions’ media rights for every French target…And it paid off!
Together, we signed their first proof of concept with one of the leading French TV channels, an owner of many sports rights, this represented WSC Sports’ first contract with a French broadcaster. Stronger than ever, the WSC Sports team kept working hard to engage with the hottest media players and this never-give-up attitude helped them become increasingly well-known in the ecosystem — and at ease with the French cultural codes. At the end of 2022 their efforts paid off signing several additional contracts, with other media leaders and sports clubs, and we’re not even mentioning the ones still under discussion.
“Maor has been an amazing investor and partner for WSC Sports over the last few years, helping to fuel the growth of the company,” said Daniel Shichman, CEO and Co-Founder at WSC Sports.
“Maor’s hands-on approach has been instrumental in WSC Sports penetrating the French sports and media market. They’ve opened new doors, ensured that we meet the right people and actively help us to close new business opportunities.
In addition to their local support unlocking the French market, their availability, financial knowledge and experience is proving indispensable, guiding us to grow WSC Sports in a healthy and responsible way.”
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We’re extremely proud and grateful for the trusting relationship we have built with WSC Sports, which clearly demonstrates our respective values and commitments as an investor, and as a portfolio startup. There is no better way for us at Maor to define a successful business development initiative. Even if at times we lose, we lose together and come out stronger as a team. With WSC Sports, we have learned to trust each other, to work together strategically, to pitch together, and to propose and develop new business opportunities; but what we most enjoy and keep looking forward to at Maor is hearing about WSC Sports customer success stories — especially from the French market.
