Momentum is not sustainability Startups : welcome to adulthood !

Opinon by Anne-Sophie Delage, Head of Talent & Anissa Bacar, People Manager

When we look back at how the startup and VC space has evolved in France, it reminds us of a child growing up: from early innocence to teenage trouble waters and now entering adulthood. It’s been a journey full of curiosity, energy, mistakes and hard-won lessons.

Born Curious. Raised by Capital.

In France, the startup and VC ecosystem grew like a child. At first, it wasn’t really taken seriously, much like how adults dismiss kids’ ideas. But we had the U.S., our “big brother” (no double meaning here), generating a mix of admiration and jealousy, a role model, a challenger, and sometimes a tormentor.

At that stage, the startup “child” was still an infant, curious, energetic, but dependent on the “parents”: our dear and caring Big Institutional LPs: Station F, BPIfrance… They gave us structure, support, and the confidence to take our first steps.

Those early years were exciting and messy. Money flowed easily, the world was doing better and the ecosystem was boiling, like a newborn excited and craving for more. Growth was the goal, speed was the metric, and founders’ vision alone often felt like enough. It was an age of enthusiasm, of freedom and of limited accountability.

Adolescence Hits: Momentum Isn’t Maturity

But then, multiple crises hit and then interest rates went up, liquidity dried out, and the teenage years began for our startups and founders. Being full of energy and feeling invincible led to heading down into the reality of overvaluation, high turnover, failed pivots and realizing the hard truth that momentum is not sustainability.

We would wonder: Who are we? What should we do? What do we want to become? Do we need help? How do we make it on our own?

A moment of transition, hard to accept and filled with complex realities: money for some sectors but not for others, growing competition across Europe, covid, wars, political tensions hurting the ecosystem…

It’s the discomfort of adolescence, the urge to rebel, the need for attention, yet the pressure to grow up, to prove oneself and to stand alone. As we all know, adolescence is often the time of crisis.

As a consequence, the role of entrepreneurs going through these turbulences needed adaptations, a shift of strategy, a new mindset and of course a change in managing their businesses.

From scaling hype to scaling truth: Real growth, real metrics.

Grieving the childhood years and getting ready for adulthood: a stage that demands more maturity, a steadier, more balanced management approach and leaders who act as true business builders rather than pure visionaries selling dreams for the next round of funding.

Today we believe that VC investors and entrepreneurs are in adulthood: still dreamers, but less naïve. Now with experience and maturity, ready to pursue sustainable growth to hit real business metrics and to face constraints not as limits, but as challenges to overcome. Many examples emerge when we think about it:

• Not only ARR but also NRR, because revenue quality and retention have finally replaced vanity KPIs.
• Burn multiple, because efficiency is as important as growth.
• Payback period, to understand how fast investments convert into value
• Gross margin, because profitability is at the heart of resilient business models.
• Employee engagement and eNPS, because culture and cohesion directly influence performance and retention.

Of course, every analogy has its limits. (But we love analogies !)

So what’s next? Hopefully, a new stage of maturity for startups, for founders, and for us investors.

A stage where passion stays high but feet stay firmly on the ground, leading to sustainable, high-impact businesses.

It’s exactly the stage we’re leaning into at Breega’s Scaling Squad as we work every day alongside our portfolio companies.

And this new adulthood doesn’t mean playing smaller, it means playing smarter. In the end, it’s about building companies that last, not just companies that raise.