< Fintech's Most Powerful Dealmakers of 2016

17. François Robinet
Managing Partner
AXA Strategic Ventures
Last year: 16

Since Paris-based insurance giant AXA launched AXA Strategic Ventures in February 2015, François Robinet, managing partner of the €230 million ($257 million) fund, has been methodically building a global team with a presence in the key markets of London, New York, and San Francisco. “First and foremost, it’s a question of having the right people involved,” says Robinet, 49, who earlier in his AXA career served as the insurer’s chief risk officer, CEO of AXA Rosenberg Investment Management, and head of AXA Life Invest. Imran Akram, formerly of early- and growth-stage venture capital firm DN Capital, has been installed as AXA Strategic Ventures’ London general partner. AXA veteran Manish Agarwal is the general partner in New York. Alex Scherbakovsky, who has fintech investing experience with New Enterprise Associates, Silver Lake, 3i Group, and FTV Capital (at which Robinet is a strategic advisory board member — see Brad Bernstein and Richard Garman, No. 7), heads the San Francisco office. One of the firm’s investment vehicles, ASV Early Stage, has deployed about $25 million so far, adding over the past year stakes in Swiss car-trading platform Autolina, London-based wearables platform BioBeats, and Brooklyn, New York, healthy-habits tracking app developer Wellth. Robinet says his growth-stage investment vehicle, ASV Capital, will announce its first deal before year-end. Robinet anticipates rounding out his team with an office in Asia and is thinking about adding a fund-of-funds portfolio. “When we started as a concept two years ago, insurance was still seen as an industry where there wasn’t a lot of innovation, and we didn’t see at that time a lot of interesting stuff in insure-tech,” Robinet says. “It has changed completely,” with start-ups proliferating in such “different dimensions of the insurance world” as software, models, big data, risk management, underwriting, and marketing.

 
The 2016 Fintech Finance 35

1. Jonathan Korngold General Atlantic 2. Matthew Harris Bain Capital Ventures 3. Jane Gladstone Evercore Partners Private Markets Investment Outlook Q2 2025: Opportunities Amid Uncertainty Sponsored by Schroders Capital May 1, 2025 4. James Robinson III & James Robinson IV RRE Ventures 5. Steven McLaughlin Financial Technology Partners 6. Amy Nauiokas & Sean Park Anthemis Group

7. Richard Garman & Brad Bernstein FTV Capital 8. Gerard von Dohlen Broadhaven Capital Partners 9. Darren Cohen Goldman Sachs Group 10. Hans Morris Nyca Partners 11. Meyer (Micky) Malka Ribbit Capital 12. Maria Gotsch Partnership Fund for New York City

13. Barry Silbert Digital Currency Group 14. Jay Reinemann Propel Venture Partners 15. Mariano Belinky Santander InnoVentures 16. Justin Brownhill & Neil DeSena SenaHill Partners 17. François Robinet AXA Strategic Ventures 18. Vanessa Colella Citi Ventures

19. Michael Schlein Accion International 20. Kenneth Marlin Marlin & Associates 21. Rumi Morales CME Ventures 22. Alastair (Alex) Rampell Andreessen Horowitz 23. Steve Gibson Euclid Opportunities 24. Fabian Vandenreydt SWIFT

25. Vladislav Solodkiy Life.SREDA 26. Gardiner Garrard III TTV Capital 27. Nektarios Liolios Startupbootcamp Fintech 28. Lawrence Wintermeyer Innovate Finance 29. Bina Kalola Bank of America Merrill Lynch 30. Hyder Jaffrey Fintech Innovation

31. Calvin Choi AMTD Group 32. Janos Barberis FinTech Hong Kong 33. Jalak Jobanputra Future Perfect Ventures 34. Sopnendu Mohanty Monetary Authority of Singapore 35. Oskar Mielczarek de la Miel Rakuten FinTech Fund