The News

Jean Schmitt named managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners

24/03/2005

Paris, 24 March 2005 – Sofinnova Partners is pleased to announce that Jean Schmitt has been promoted to Managing Partner.

Jean Schmitt, 39, joined Sofinnova Partners’ Information Technology team as Partner in December 2001. He is particularly interested in opportunities in new technologies in the telecommunications sector. At Sofinnova he has focused on mobile telephony, investing in embedded software such as Java Virtual Machines (Esmertec), mobile game technologies (InfraWorlds), fingerprint sensors (UPEK), and acoustic-based tactile user interfaces (Sensitive Object).  He is a board member of Esmertec, UPEK, InfraWorlds, Sensitive Object and CTS.

Prior to joining Sofinnova Partners, Jean was the founder of several companies, including  SLP InfoWare, a world leader in predictive customer relationship management software for the telecom industry, which he sold to Gemplus in 2000. He is a graduate of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications (ENST) and has a post-graduate degree in Artificial Intelligence.

“This promotion reflects the excellent contribution Jean has made to the IT team and to the partnership,” said Jean-Bernard Schmidt, Chairman and a Managing Partner. “It also reflects our full confidence as we begin investing our new fund.” Sofinnova Capital V closed in early February at €385 million.

For further information, please contact:
Madeleine Resener
Media Relations
Sofinnova Partners
Tel: +33 (0) 53 05 41 00 / +33 (0) 6 20 41 39 82
mresener@sofinnova.fr

About Sofinnova Partners
Founded in Paris in 1972, Sofinnova Partners is one of Europe's leading independent venture capital firms. With €900 million under management, Sofinnova Partners invests in start-ups and early-stage companies in information technology and life sciences. Its investment strategy consists of investing early in teams and projects with high potential, most often acting as lead or co-lead investor. Sofinnova Partners also benefits from a long-established relationship with its sister company in San Francisco, Sofinnova Ventures. Sofinnova Partners’ teams consist of 12 professionals who bring market insight and technical expertise to portfolio companies.