Shaping the Future of Freelancing with €2M Seed Funding

By Charles Thomas, CEO of comet

At comet, we transform the way freelancers and companies work together. That was our original goal back one year ago, when it was just me, Valentin and Joseph. We’re happy to say that our startup is more alive now than ever.

And What a Time to Be Alive!

As comet blows out its first birthday candle, we have received a fantastic reward for a year of hard work. We have just raised €2M in seed funding! Saying that we feel honored would be an understatement, as we are backed by outstanding investors such as Otium and Xavier Niel’s Kima Ventures. But before telling you more about why we raised this round and what we plan to do with the money, let’s go back in time to explain why comet exists in the first place.

Genesis: From Non-tech Founders to a Tech Startup

We strongly believe that all corporations need to become tech and data companies to survive in the changing digital landscape. Ironically enough, we started our tech venture with a non-tech team as Valentin, Joseph and I were engineers, but engineers with very little coding skill. Our company’s survival was not a foregone conclusion. But as former business managers in IT services companies, we were familiar with freelancing. So we teamed up with tech freelancers from the very beginning to build comet together and have an initial validation of our product-market fit.

Vision: Developing a Learning Mindset

My engineering degree and first work experiences in IT services companies never taught me anything about startups. My brilliant friend Paul Guillemindid. In 2015, he founded Fretlink, a logistics startup that had recently been accepted into The Family, a top-notch infrastructure in the startup landscape. He told me once:

“The Family is an incredible ecosystem of entrepreneurs, mentors and investors. To me, it’s the best place in Europe to scale your startup. Just go there, have a chat with them and see it for yourself.”

Thank you, buddy, this was one of the best pieces of advice I have ever received!

My new hobby quickly became binge-watching inspiring talks by the three founders Alice Zagury, Oussama Ammar and Nicolas Colin on Startupfoodand to learn the fundamentals of entrepreneurship on Koudetat. But my personal milestone was my admission to the first edition of Lion by The Family, then a brand new program for aspiring startup employees.

Ecosystem: Surrounding Yourself with People You Admire

Full disclosure: even then, I was obviously not looking for a full-time job in a promising startup. Lion was actually my cheval de Troie to get into the startup world and The Family’s ecosystem. But beyond the lessons I received at Lion about entrepreneurship and startups, I got to know some fantastic people.

An encounter with Miguel de Fontenay was a game-changer for comet. We passed the admissions process for joining The Family shortly afterwards, Miguel became our main advisor and we met those who would become our first employees. Paul had been right: The Family really is the place to be when building a startup in Europe. And that’s how the comet spaceship was launched!

Product: The Early Days Are All About Bootstrapping

Still, we didn’t have a product. Nor did we have a single tech guy in the team. But we knew where we were heading. On a Sunday evening, Joseph discovered Bubble: a great tool to create a web app without writing a line of code. Our Minimum Viable Product (MVP) was ready overnight!

From that moment on, our respective roles became crystal clear. Joseph would be the Product owner, Valentin would be in charge of matching the right freelancer with the right project, and I would grow both our community of freelancers and portfolio of clients, along with guiding our first employees. We were ready to conquer galaxies, with the motto “Fake it till you make it” always in mind.

Team: from 3 to 30

The most decisive team member we met is undoubtedly Arnaud, who joined comet as a co-founder and CTO. He was the man for the job of transforming comet into a solid tech company. As a former Lead Developer at Stupeflix (later acquired by GoPro) and CTO at Nuage (backed by The Family), he is a gifted entrepreneur who quickly got started building and managing a growing team of ten software engineers, product managers and data scientists. Beyond just his tech expertise, Arnaud is a natural fit in terms of vision, work ethic and friendliness, both with the team and investors. Plus, his cute little dog Lya has become the office mascot!

When scaling up your team, there are two essential things to never lose sight of: focus and culture. At comet, our focus is twofold as we both aim at building the best platform and growing the most awesome community. So in hiring sales talents, creating content or crafting a marketing strategy, we always make sure that those projects coincide with our common goals regarding product and community. Eventually, culture becomes responsible for the alignment and cohesion of the team. Onboarding, transparency, personal development and knowledge management are important assets that we have developed to ensure that each team member who joins comet feels good in their role and within the company.

Business: Listen First, Act Next

From meetups with freelancers to meetings with top managers, our priority was to understand both sides of the spectrum before solving problems and removing frictions one by one. When tackling such a huge market, it is imperative to listen first and to act next. Our strategy paid off: within the past year, we have completed 300+ projects for 150+ companies and attracted 1500+ freelancers to our growing community. Also, our business volume has increased from 0 to €600k per month.

The Future: Scaling Up

Raising €2M is a big step but not an end in itself. I’m sure Otium and Kima Ventures would agree with me on this one. Pierre and Bruno from Otium have impressed me with their commitment and speed of execution. Jean de la Rochebrochard from Kima has been excellent as usual in supporting and empowering the young entrepreneurs that we are. Again, thank you very much to all of you! It means a lot to us.

Having money in the bank will help comet shine on a larger scale. We have identified three priorities for our growth:

→ build a vibrant and renowned community of tech & data freelancers;

→ spread our vision across France to become the platform of reference for tech & data freelancers;

→ develop a cutting-edge product that provides the most seamless user experience possible.

Long-term Goal: Reshape the Way Engineers Work

At comet, we are firm believers that the future of work will be on-demand. Agility should be a priority for every company — and that implies a more flexible talent acquisition process. Freelancing has already become the new norm among engineers. The recent craze for startups has shown that many tech talents are above all entrepreneurs. And guess what is the common point between startup founders and freelancers? Bingo: both of them are entrepreneurs.

We are convinced that the next wave of entrepreneurs will be freelancers. It is our mission to provide these top tech talents with the best daily experience possible through freelancing. This is why we aim to evangelize and educate companies about the unique opportunity that this major trend represents for their future. Tech talent recruitment is broken for a large majority of companies, who are failing to attract top engineers. Thus they need to reinvent their way of working.

Comet will connect engineering as we know it to its bright future. Our long-term goal is to shape the future of work for the tech & data workforce in Europe and beyond.

And you are all invited to join us… on our brand new website

Feel free to share this post with your network! You can also write to us to discuss about freelancing or the future of work (we answer everybody): [email protected]

PS: Thanks Benjamin Perrin & Kyle Hall for your help with the copywriting!