In 2023, Comet continued its drive for innovation and internationalization, with conclusive results. Once again profitable for the full year, as in 2022, it posted sales of 35 million euros and growth of 30% versus 2022. In a particularly turbulent market, Comet has succeeded in combining the expertise it has acquired to offer a comprehensive range of office and hybrid working solutions that companies have come to expect. The company has therefore appointed a new management team dedicated to achieving a new growth milestone. The company's three objectives are to consolidate Comet's position in France and Europe, consolidate its three existing offerings, and accelerate the deployment of its business in the events segment.
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The year 2023 will have been extremely rich in projects and achievements for Comet. Drawing on its expertise in hybrid working and new ways of organizing office work, the company launched a new offering, Comet Workplaces, while strengthening its positions in its existing offering Comet Hospitalitywith the opening of its operated spaces in the Tour Alto and the arrival of the first tenants in the Landscape Tower. As for its long-standing offering, Comet Meetings, the company has just announced the opening of Comet Arboretum, its 13th venue, illustrating its growing strength in large-scale events .
This new triptych of offerings enables Comet to provide companies, asset owners and landlords with a comprehensive and 100% flexible solution, compatible with the major changes in usage in the office segment:
Comet has thus designed a three-dimensional model that is both complete and modular, for companies that have now integrated hybrid working into their organization and real estate management, and demand flexibility in terms of office space and meeting and event venues.
If market response in France has been positive for Comet, it has also been positive in the other countries where it operates. It has strengthened its position in Brussels, and has just launched the extension of Comet Retiro in Madrid, to meet growing local demand, just one year after its arrival in the country .
According to Victor Carreau: "After the shocks experienced by the post-pandemic market, companies and asset owners are looking for efficient solutions in terms of office space, meeting rooms and event facilities. The solutions we now offer provide a qualitative, modular and comprehensive response to all their financial and usage challenges. Not only do we offer venues that are perfectly designed to socialize and cooperate when teams come together, but we also bring flexibility and a revaluation of traditional office assets to the market. This new model aggregates and sedimentates all our acquired experience, and certainly represents the future of office real estate in a context of widespread hybrid working".
Comet intends to maintain the pace of its growth in 2024 in France, Belgium and Spain on a common experiential foundation, while taking into account the specific features of each of these markets. It has therefore opted for verticalized operational management by country, supported by a cross-functional French team that will work to maintain the offering and quality of customer experience that are Comet's hallmarks. This new organization also involves Comet's founding partners: Maxime Albertus, co-founder and Chief Operations Officer, becomes General Manager Big Events. Nicolas Findling, Chief Resource Officer and co-founder of Comet, becomes General Manager for Spain. Victor Carreau remains CEO.
A graduate of IAE Grenoble, Julie Gamundi is a human resources professional who has always held the position of HR Director in a context of hyper-growth. She joined Comet in 2020, having previously headed HR at Artdesk and then Ornikar. She will now be responsible for the general management of the historic "Meetings" business in France, as well as for managing the site teams of Comet's two most recent offerings: Comet Hospitality and Comet Workplaces. Julie sees this new mission as a new human adventure: "Comet is a company where people are at the heart of everything. My experience in human resources will be invaluable for our three offerings Comet Workplaces, Comet Hospitality and Comet Meetings. Indeed, the latter is run on a daily basis by the company's biggest team, and therefore naturally concentrates a lot of management issues."
Frédéric Walter joined Comet in November 2023. This finance and investment expert brings his solid knowledge of hyper-growth companies in changing markets. A graduate of Télécom and Sciences-Po Paris, Frédéric began his career in consulting and then corporate finance at Virgin Mobile, before joining Notus Technologie, Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux's holding company, where he led investment operations as Managing Director. Keen to experience the startup world from the inside, he then joined Moni as CFO, a position in which he obtained a payment institution license from theACPR. He was also a lecturer at Science Po Paris for 4 years. As CFO and HR Director at Comet, he will be responsible for both Finance and Human Resources. He sees his mission as a new way of looking at his job as a financier: "Comet wishes to accelerate its growth by having strong ambitions that are based as much on financial control as on a mobilized, fulfilled team and high-level talent. It'san exciting mission, and I'm delighted to be involved in it from now on."
A graduate of ESTP and HEC, Matthieu worked for 10 years at Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, first in the Development Department, then as Head of Innovation and Startup Acceleration and Corporate Venture, and finally as Deputy Director of Operations, member of Comex France, in charge of business development and management of a €5 billion portfolio of commercial real estate assets. Matthieu joins Comet at the beginning of 2020 as Chief Development Officer. In this role, he negotiated and managed Comet's real estate development in France and abroad, as well as the launch of the 2 new offers Comet Hospitality and Comet Workplaces , whose deployment and implementation he continues to oversee. With the addition of Belgium to his responsibilities, Matthieu will be putting his expertise at the service of the development of a market that is still growing. "Our three offerings Comet Meetings, Comet Hospitality and Comet Workplaces are a unique response to the upheavals in usage that are shaking up the real estate industry. Steering their development and working on their implementation hand in hand with our partners and the various property owners is an exciting challenge! As far as my new responsibilities in Belgium are concerned, my ambition is to respond to the specificities of this market in terms of hybrid work and events, in order to accelerate our growth curve. It's an exciting challenge, given that Brussels has the particularity of concentrating companies with different needs, international groups and European institutions."
An HEC graduate (2015), Romina Maillochaud first worked as a strategy and organization consultant at Mad Network, focusing on customer experience for brands mainly from the luxury and retail sectors. Hired in 2018, two years after the launch of Comet, Romina is one of the company's longest-serving employees. She has been involved in all the stages contributing to offering a first-class experience in unique and perfectly designed venues. In her new role as Chief Experience Officer, she takes on a strategic, cross-functional role that involves designing and guaranteeing a quality global experience, not only aligned with Comet's commitment to excellence and creativity, but also adapted to the specificities of each market. " For this new challenge, I'm like a Comet super client who would put high standards first. This role allows me to put all the experience I've gained through Comet's European development to work for our offering. My aim is to guarantee a consistently high level of expertise and service quality in each of our locations," she explains.
Charles Buseyne joins Comet in 2022 as Head of Product, before taking charge of the entire Digital & Data division. A graduate of Sciences-Po Paris and HEC, Charles is an expert in both digital and revenue management, having previously worked for Air France-KLM and Expedia. As Comet expands to 13 locations in Europe, Charles and his teams will be responsible for providing customers with ever smoother, more personalized journeys, thanks to data and new technologies.
