Bright Pixel becomes the main investor in French retail app store Beamy’s investment round of €300,000, and will also sit on its board of directors.

Bright Pixel continues to grow its portfolio of retail solutions with a stake in Beamy’s €300,000 investment round.

French retail startup Beamy presents a platform that functions as an “app store” that brings together hundreds of technological solutions applied to retail. This is the first investment by Bright Pixel in a French startup, with the aim of reinforcing the company building studio’s international presence.

“We saw in Beamy a very ambitious team that created an innovative and differentiating solution in a very competitive market. In addition to being one of the main investors in this round of capital raising, we will also have a place on the board of directors, allowing us to monitor the company closely and pass on our experience and know-how,” said Bright Pixel CIO Alexandre Santos in a statement.

“This startup also allows us to have close contact with several technological players dedicated to developing solutions for the retail,” he added.

Founded in 2017, Beamy enables retailers to search more than 150 solutions that best fit their needs, analyze the use of technological solutions within the company, monitor their impact and centrally manage their solutions while accessing and creating synergies between the various solutions from a single interface.

“We are very excited to have Bright Pixel as an investor and partner and we are convinced that their help will be invaluable in accelerating our growth,” said, Beamy CEO Andréa Jacquemin in a statement.

“Medium-sized retailers use more than 50 technology solutions, five times more than five years ago, and this trend is expected to continue, creating management problems for retailers. The Beamy platform will support the management of all applications in a single interface,” added Jacquemin.

Beamy is Bright Pixel’s latest bet in retail, which joins a portfolio rich in solutions in this sector including Portuguese startups Sensei and Reckon.ai, as well as Polish startup Placeme.

This latest investment into Beamy also enhances the presence of Bright Pixel internationally.

“We want to become a strong player in the entrepreneurial ecosystem at a national and international level and have acted strategically in this direction, as creators of innovative projects, initiative and talent boosters, incubators and mentors of startups, and as investors,” added Santos.

In May Bright Pixel announced its first international partnership with Spanish startup accelerator EGI Booster to attract retail and ecommerce talent across borders.

Bright Pixel’s first international partnership furthers its mission to be one of the main engines of technological development and digital transformation in Europe.

Read More: Bright Pixel announces 1st intl partnership to ‘attract talent across borders’

And in June, Bright Pixel announced the launch of its “Insert Coin” program to invest in, and develop, preliminary ideas at the Lisbon Investment Summit.

Read More: Bright Pixel launches ‘Insert Coin’ to invest in preliminary ideas: LIS18

“Bright Pixel is the only entity in Portugal that invests in preliminary ideas. We differentiate ourselves by wanting to help projects grow because we know that good ideas do not always come from the best entrepreneurs, nor do the best entrepreneurs have the best ideas,” said Bright Pixel CEO Celso Martinho in a statement to the press at the time.