February 2024 - Following a call for applications which met with great success, five female athletes have been selected to join the third class of the Palatine Women Project. From March and for nine months, they will benefit from tailor-made and personalized support to help them create their entrepreneurial project or develop their business.
Palatine Women Project is fully part of the Paris 2024 legacy program, of which Banque Palatine is a premium partner, on its athlete retraining component.
Patrick Ibry, Deputy Managing Director of Banque Palatine, declared about this third promotion: “ Our desire, when we launched the Palatine Women Project two years ago, was to make it long-term and to be able to support high-level athletes wishing to develop their business project. We started with a first class of four athletes, continued with a class of seven athletes with varied profiles and I am delighted with the five profiles that we will support this year. We are pleased to have mobilized an entire ecosystem of companies and recognized players from around the world sport… around these passionate and determined women. ".
Palatine Women Project: five new athletes in the starting blocks
The mentoring committee chaired by Patrick Ibry, deputy general manager of Banque Palatine and made up of Véronique Bourez, president of View Beyond; Pascale Auger, general manager & company director and co-president of the women's network – Professional Women's Network (PWN Paris); Séverine Desbouys, co-founder of the Palatine Women Project; William Du Poy, President of For Value; Sébastien Imbert, CEO, ykaria.tech, ex-CMO Microsoft France; Olivier Sampeur, General Manager, EF Corporate Education; Nathalie Simon, former sportswoman and television presenter; Thierry Martinez, communications director Banque Palatine has selected:
- Myriam Benadda, amateur MMA fighter, French Pankration champion and mixed karate vice-champion, founded Enyo Women's Fightwear, the first French brand of combat sports clothing exclusively dedicated to women. Her brand innovates by offering technical clothing designed for female bodies, while minimizing the ecological impact with the use of recycled materials. At the same time, she provides boxing and MMA classes in companies, while breaking down prejudices about the female practice of combat sports.
- Aude Bredel, former member of the French hopeful golf team. She created GolfHER, an ecosystem that works to support women in golf. “The idea of GolfHER is to bring together all women into a single community. This platform is accessible via a 100% female social network which is aimed at players of all levels, professional players as well as women who work in the golf industry. We work in parallel with golf stakeholders to support them in their feminization strategy,” she explains.
- Maé-bérénice Méité, Olympic figure skater for the French senior team and six-time French champion. Alongside her sporting career, she led a double project which allowed her to obtain a master's degree in management and marketing in June 2021 with a specialization in business development. As part of her dissertation, she looked at the cultural dichotomy present in the management of many amateur sports, focusing particularly on the French Ice Sports Federation, with the aim of proposing a sustainable solution in accordance with the needs of athletes and current technological advances. Through her research, she designed an adaptable and customizable solution for multiple sports, basing her current project, Sports UNLMTD, on these principles.
- Malia Metella, Olympic vice-champion and world vice-champion in the 50 m freestyle, is also known for having achieved the feat of swimming across Lake Titicaca by towing a 500 kg raft for 11 days over 108 km. In parallel with her sporting activities, she is co-founder of a micro-investment fund called “Tremplin Capital”, specializing in investments in priority neighborhoods of the city with a social impact. Its business project focused on the creation of a site to disconnect in nature, including 6 Tiny Houses designed with different materials and different styles including a large play area for children; a fitness area and a space dedicated to pet therapy…
- Audrey Prieto, World wrestling champion in 2007, twice European vice-champion, bronze medalist at the world championship in 2008, Audrey is one of the references in French wrestling. Involved in the Alice Milliat Foundation as General Delegate, President of the US Metro but also institutional director of Vaires-Torcy leisure, Audrey created School holidays, an innovative solution for businesses and parents, in order to combine personal and professional life. It is the reception of employees' children either at their workplace or nearby in company pools for rent with an agile system for half or full days with a particularity on the contents of the days with sport, exemptions from lessons in foreign languages requested by parents (English, Arabic, Chinese), knitting, cooking classes, etc. A project in constant evolution following the ideas of its founder.
Palatine Women Project: a community of skills serving sports entrepreneurs
Lasting nine months, the mentoring program is organized in three complementary phases aimed at qualifying the project, defining the business model and deploying it.
- A first phase of skills assessments, to list skills, develop a project and set objectives;
- Collective or individual workshops with experts, to enable skills development and the resolution of initial problems;
- And finally the personalization of the project, with the first meetings with entrepreneurs and potential investors, the management and progress of the project.
Palatine Women Project: successes and concrete results
After nine months of support, the six projects of promotion two experienced unprecedented acceleration.
Margaux Rifkiss (fencer) provides lessons in three Ephads with lasting partnerships; Lenaïg Corson (rugbywoman) set up three ecological and dietary rugby courses for twenty girls for her first year; Eva and Jade (fencers) have set up their coaching platform and have several clients in their first year; Sarah Ourahmoune (former boxer) experienced strong growth, which led her to expand her inside boxing room; Paoline Ekambi (former basketball player) redefined its offer and obtained a contract with one of the establishments of the BPCE group, to source 12 sports candidates; and finally Raisy Bantoo, (former professional basketball player) redefined her offer and financially structured her activity.
Alongside these successes, the program continues to support Coralie Gassama (sprinter), athlete of promotion one, including the famous footballer Dayot Upamecano recently chose to invest with its start-up Keyena.
The strength of a program also lies in its ability to know how to bring together stakeholders who work every day for the athletes. Thus, the Palatine Women Project can count on the active participation of Paris 2024, from the National Sports Agency (ANS), the National Institute of Sport, Expertise and Performance (INSEP), the French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF) and the Sports Foundation French (FSF) to offer a panel of athlete entrepreneurs interested in joining the program.
Palatine Women Project: a collective of partners – mentors engaged in the transmission of experiences and knowledge
A complementary team of educational mentors, entrepreneurs, business developers, export specialists and even entrepreneur clients of Banque Palatine and collaborators supports each mentee according to their needs. The mentors share their experiences and networks with the entrepreneur for a few hours per month and support each athlete in improving their skills and bringing their new professional project to fruition. Have thus become involved in the mentoring committee of the promotion three program: Elisabeth Dartigues, CEO and Founder, Mon coach Mobilité; Julie Benoist, Regional director Africa at MND; Mathieu Zamanian, Chief Executive Officer, MyDataModels, as well as Pascal Fliche, CEO the Lab – Digital Collective. Palatine Human Resources Department is also involved in offering “developing leadership” training, My Mobility Coach is involved in skills assessments, HULT EF Corporate Education joined forces by offering a personalized training course in English and finally Uniqlo offers athletes outfits, as well as clothing coaching.
Contact
Thierry Martinez: +33 (0)6 88.77 31 67
