Captain Wallet

Captain Wallet provides a mobile marketing platform that enables brands to connect with customers through native smartphone wallet applications like Apple Wallet and Google Pay. Founded in Paris in 2013 by Axel Detours, Bertrand Leroy, and Alexandre Plichon, the company was established to leverage the pre-installed wallet apps on mobiles as a direct customer relationship channel. Co-founder Axel Detours brought a diverse background in communications and strategy, having worked for the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and as Chief of Staff for McDonald's France, experiences that informed the company's focus on brand-to-consumer communication.

The company operates on a SaaS business model, offering a platform for businesses to create, distribute, and manage digital content such as loyalty cards, coupons, e-tickets, and membership cards. This allows their clients—primarily retailers and large consumer-facing brands—to engage with their customers without requiring them to download a dedicated application. The service monetizes by providing tools to send personalized and geolocated push notifications, update offers in real-time, and automate marketing campaigns, thereby integrating directly with a brand's existing CRM systems from providers like Salesforce and Adobe. Captain Wallet serves a wide array of sectors including retail, hospitality, and insurance, with clients such as McDonald's, Lacoste, Decathlon, and Guerlain.

A significant milestone in the company's history was its acquisition by the digital marketing platform Brevo (formerly Sendinblue) on February 9, 2023. This acquisition was a strategic move for Brevo to enhance its offerings with a specialized mobile wallet marketing channel, while providing Captain Wallet with the resources for significant international expansion, particularly in the United States and Germany. Prior to the acquisition, Captain Wallet had raised approximately $1.76 million in funding over two rounds in 2018 from investor M Capital. Post-acquisition, Captain Wallet continues to operate as an independent solution, and co-founder Axel Detours took on the role of Senior Vice President of Global Sales at Brevo.

Keywords: mobile wallet marketing, customer engagement, digital loyalty cards, Apple Wallet marketing, Google Pay marketing, CRM integration, push notifications, customer retention, retail marketing, SaaS, dematerialization, drive-to-store, mobile customer relations, personalized marketing, e-booking, click and collect, digital offers, mobile coupons, customer experience, Brevo, Axel Detours, Bertrand Leroy