PRESS RELEASE
from LIGHTON
LIGHTON announces the launch of its IPO on the Euronext Growth market in Paris.
LIGHTON Promotional communication Do not distribute directly or indirectly in the United States, Canada, Australia or Japan Press release Paris, 8 November 2024 LIGHTON ANNOUNCES THE LAUNCH OF ITS IPO ON THE EURONEXT GROWTH® MARKET IN PARIS
LightOn (the “Company”), a leading European player in generative AI for businesses[2], announces the launch of its IPO on the Euronext Growth® market in Paris (ISIN code: FR0013230950 – Ticker: ALTAI-FR). On 7 November 2024, the French financial markets authority (Autorité des Marchés Financiers - AMF) approved the Prospectus under number 24-475, comprising the Registration Document, approved on 21 October 2024 under number I.24-012, supplement to the registration document approved on 7 November 2024 under number 24-015, a Securities Note and the Prospectus Summary (included in the Securities Note and appended to this press release). These documents are available free of charge and upon request from the Company (2 Place de la Bourse, 75002 Paris, France) and on the websites of the company (https://investir.lighton.ai) and the AMF (https://www.amf-france.org). Igor Carron and Laurent Daudet, co-CEOs and co-founders of LightOn, comment: “LightOn's IPO would mark a major milestone in our growth trajectory and settle our position as a benchmark player in generative AI in Europe[3]. This planned IPO offers investors a unique opportunity to participate directly in the growth of a French technology champion[4] that is already successfully deploying its AI solutions with major groups in France and abroad. As the first listed European company specializing in generative AI, LightOn is paving the way for a new technological era. We hope that many of you will take part in this revolution, which is pushing back the frontiers of what is possible and profoundly transforming business practices.” Generative AI: an in-depth transformation of business practices Generative AI will disrupt the business world. From services to industry and trade, all sectors will be affected by the numerous benefits provided. According to McKinsey, the potential productivity gains enabled by generative AI will automate nearly half of the hours worked in Europe and the United States by 2035.[5] A new era is opening up for companies that want to offer their employees a way to reinvent work. The promises of generative AI are huge and the global market is gigantic, estimated at more than $1.3 trillion in 2032[6]. LightOn, a leading European player in generative AI for businesses[7] Founded in 2016 by Igor Carron and Laurent Daudet, two experts with background in top-level French and American academic research and with experience in the world’s largest engineering sciences laboratories, up until 2020 LightOn developed an optical processor (Optical Processing Unit) designed to rapidly process data in AI applications, with low energy consumption. Focused on generative AI since 2020, LightOn has designed 12 Large Language Models (LLMs) in only four years, capable of working with more than 100 billion parameters, thanks to its ability to access European supercomputers and the computing power of cloud giants, making the Company one of the few players in the world with this technological capacity. LightOn has also developed generative IA functionalities combined with these LLM. During this period, LightOn has also structured its workforce with 41 employees to date, two-thirds of whom are dedicated to technology and one-third dedicated to accelerating the marketing of its solutions used by top-tier private and public businesses. In addition to the management team, all of LightOn’s employees – who are highly qualified (11 PhDs) and multicultural (10 nationalities) – contribute to the success of its developments and solutions thanks to their complementary skills. Forge and Paradigm: sovereign and tailored solutions LightOn has developed and markets two software solutions. Forge, marketed since 2022, is a technological support for a customized generative AI aimed at companies and organizations who want to develop their own language model, improve an existing language model or integrate new technological building blocks like RAG[8] or agents. Paradigm, marketed in 2024, is a ready-to-use generative AI platform designed to meet all the needs of businesses and the public sector. It harnesses the power of generative AI to optimize and enhance business productivity by automating various business processes. This software platform stands out through its customization capabilities, user-friendliness, and powerful features, enabling rapid integration within organizations. As a complete turnkey solution, Paradigm is built on an advanced architecture that combines a LLM with multimodal Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG), allowing intelligent interaction with the company's document corpus through natural language queries. Furthermore, it includes highly specialized intelligent agents capable of autonomously creating and managing complex workflows, such as responding to requests for proposals. Solutions already marketed directly to major accounts in France, in the United States and in EMEA In 2023, Forge was rolled out to several major organizations, including a Silicon Valley company in the United States developing medical assistant AI that used LightOn’s bespoke technological support to build its first LLM prototype, to run its virtual health workers, in four months. Forge was previously deployed at a research institute in EMEA. In 2024, Paradigm has also been adopted by businesses, with numerous major French accounts already deploying the solution, convinced by its capabilities, in an initial test and evaluation phase (POC – proof of concept). Notable clients include: the Ile-de-France region, Safran, Groupama, the French General Directorate of Public Finance, CNES (French Space Agency), French Space Command and Verlingue. The first production implementations and full-scale deployments following certain POCs are scheduled by the end of 2024. Strategic partnerships to boost sales efforts through indirect channel In addition to its direct approach, which has already won over numerous companies, LightOn has secured two strategic partnerships in the first half of 2024 with major hardware players to combine its generative AI software solution with their cloud or hardware offerings:
A committed approach to corporate social responsibility LightOn has taken a proactive approach to corporate social responsibility (CSR). This commitment is illustrated in the 50/100 rating issued by the extra-financial rating agency EthiFinance in May 2024, a level of performance described as “advanced”. With this rating, LightOn is more than six points ahead of the average for comparable companies in terms of headcount and business sector. Two strategic pillars for acceleration: Business development and international expansion Driven by its ambition to position itself among the leading players in generative AI by being among the first to benefit from the generative AI market takeoff, LightOn has defined an ambitious development strategy centered around two key priority areas:
2027 ambition: achieve revenue of c. €40m, an ARR of c. €35m and an EBITDA margin of around 40% While LightOn has historically achieved a significant share of its revenue from its Forge solution, its commercial development strategy for its Paradigm solution is driven by very strong demand from companies for generative AI. Paradigm, launched in end-2023, is currently in the testing and evaluation phase in French public and private companies. These organizations are expected to quickly initiate the first production releases and full-scale deployments by late 2024. The marketing of the Paradigm solution in the form of an annual renewable or multi-year non-renewable software license should ensure both visibility and recurrence of the majority of LightOn’s revenues. LightOn benefits from a revenue base already embedded until 2027 via its already sold multi-year licenses. Marketing of the Forge solution, essentially linked to the implementation of tailored projects with high technological expertise, makes it possible to generate additional revenues that are less recurring but individually higher. Following a 2023 year that benefited from Forge contracts, enabling the company to generate revenue of €8m and achieve profitability, LightOn has evolved its sales model and revenue structure in 2024 towards SaaS license revenues generated from its Paradigm offering. This model transition, which will temporarily impact revenue during the fiscal year while building a foundation of recurring revenue, is already showing positive results with accelerating commercial momentum month after month. Indeed, with 4 clients already secured as of July 31, 2024, representing an ARR of €0.9m, LightOn aims to double this ARR by the end of 2024 to reach approximately 10 clients[9]. For 2025, LightOn aims to accelerate revenue growth, with a strong contribution from Paradigm and an additional contribution from Forge, allowing LightOn to aim an ARR at the end of the fiscal year of c. €6m. In 2026, LightOn aims to generate positive EBITDA and free cash flow. From 2027, the acceleration should be even more marked with a revenue target of c. €40m, an ARR of c. €35m at the end of the fiscal year, around two-third of which to be generated by indirect sales of Paradigm via strategic partners, combined with an EBITDA margin of around 40%. These targets are expressed at constant scope. An IPO on Euronext Growth Paris to accelerate growth LightOn's planned IPO on Euronext Growth® Paris aims to provide the Company with the additional financial resources required to implement the key strands of its development strategy so that it can step up growth and reach its targets. As such, the net proceeds from the funds raised under the Offer of approximately € 10.4 million, i.e. net proceeds of approximately € 8.7 million (based on full subscription and before exercise of the extension clause and over-allotment option), which may be raised to around €11.9 million (after full exercise of the extension clause) and to around € 13.5 million (after full exercise of the extension clause and the over-allotment option), will be allocated as follows, after full repayment (principal + interest) of 2018 convertible bonds:
Subscription commitment of € 3m LightOn received subscription commitment of € 3 million from Axon Partners Group, representing approximately 30% of the base deal. Main terms of the transaction
If permitted by the request expressed under the Public Offer, the number of shares allocated in response to orders issued under the Public Offer will be at least equal to 10% of the number of shares offered under the Offer (before any exercise of the extension clause and the over-allotment option).
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