Our focus on profitable, digitally-enabled businesses protected the portfolio and positions us well for the world that will emerge from the pandemic. ByLaurent Foata, Head of Ardian Growth Ardian Growth targets growing completed our first transaction in Germany with and profitable companies built to benefit Kapten&Son, a fast-growing digital brand that has from digitalization and data analysis. This expanded our European footprint. positioned us well as Covid-19 lockdowns accelerated the digitalization of companies’ Despite the challenges of lockdowns processes and forced more activity into and remote working, Ardian Growth’s reputation online channels. among entrepreneurs and our ability to run flexible processes enabled us to close 20 deals (including Of the 30 companies in our portfolio, almost5 exits)over the past 18 months, in 5 different none were materially affected by Covid-19. Many countries. This includes our first two investments other companies performed strongly through the in healthcare, which is an important future area pandemic and in areas such as e-commerce, we saw of interest for growth-focused investors, as the revenues accelerate. Thanks to the robust performanceeffects of the Covid-19 pandemic have significantly across the portfolio, we were in a strong position toaccelerated developments in healthcare globally. examine complementary acquisitions for our portfolio companies that could bring new sources of growth. Among Ardian Growth’s most important advantages is our large network of digital We are already the most active and visible entrepreneurs across multiple European countries. growth-stage investors across Continental Europe,Although in-person events had to cease, we covering France, Italy, Spain, Germany and the continued to engage with our entrepreneurs regularly Benelux countries.We continue to expand our and hold digital events with industry partners, networks and seek additional opportunities in maintaining our profile among a critical audience. these areas. However, we also aim to broaden We also work increasingly closely with other our scope further and during 2020, we signed our investment teams within Ardian, sharing the insights first transaction in Switzerland, where we boughtinto digitalization and technology developments a minority interest in the fast-growing e-commercethat we gain from working with a large network of platform ProduceShop. And in early 2021 we digital entrepreneurs and innovators. 2020 ACTIVITY REPORT 73