GENERAL INQUIRIES
info@forward.oneMARKETING INQUIRIES
media@forward.oneINVESTOR RELATIONS
ir@forward.oneSensorfact’s acquisition by ABB was more than an exit. It was proof of a timeless investing truth.
FORWARD.one first met Sensorfact in late 2018 through Engie, its then-majority shareholder. The startup consisted of just seven people generating a few hundred thousand euros in revenue, operating inside a corporate structure that imposed heavy governance requirements. The backend was messy. The organization was not yet built for scale.
We recognized something compelling in the opportunity and stepped in as the first professional investor in 2019, becoming the largest shareholder.
Five years later, Sensorfact evolved into one of Europe's fastest-growing industrial scale-ups, with over 300 employees and 1,900 customers across 50+ countries, and a hardware-enabled SaaS platform cutting energy waste for manufacturers.
The acquisition by ABB in 2025 marked the end of that chapter.
Working alongside Sensorfact made one thing increasingly clear. Building the technology is only the beginning. Turning it into a scalable business is where companies are made or broken.
The journey with Sensorfact reinforced a set of principles we now apply consistently when evaluating and building companies.
Sensorfact offered a practical hardware-enabled SaaS solution: off-the-shelf sensors with proprietary firmware, connected to a platform for data analysis and action. This was strong engineering, but far from breakthrough science that would demand years of R&D to unpack.
What differentiated Sensorfact was immediate execution. Factories lose energy through inefficiencies that are often hard to detect, with manual processes and a lack of real-time data preventing manufacturers from optimizing their operations. Sensorfact addressed this by making that visible and actionable almost immediately, enabling customers to reduce energy costs within weeks.
At FORWARD.one, we look for businesses that can scale quickly because customers clearly see the value. Sensorfact proved that a simple, proven value proposition scales faster than elegant complexity.
Exceptional founders turn opportunity into execution
From day one, the defining factor was the team.
At the center was Pieter Broekema. The kind of founder who brings intensity into a room and sustains it over time.
Pieter had that rare combination of energy, discipline, and commercial instinct to build and scale with speed.
Riemer Smink, Managing Partner at FORWARD.one
What became clear over the years was how the team operated.
One of the standout elements was their intentional approach to culture. Pieter and his co-founders didn’t leave the company’s winning mentality to chance; they cultivated it purposefully, reinforcing it through every single hire until the headcount grew from 7 to over 300.
Equally important was their decision-making framework: data first, gut second. They avoided acting purely on instinct or getting stuck in analysis. Instead, they gathered the facts and committed decisively. That combination of rigour and decisiveness allowed them to move fast without making avoidable mistakes.
As the company scaled, the number of opportunities increased. They resisted the temptation to do everything and doubled down on what worked.
“Winning where you are strong before moving to where you are not is obvious in hindsight, but requires real discipline when growth is accelerating.”
Boy de Jonge, Investment Manager at FORWARD.one
That discipline defined the trajectory.
After the investment, the priority was clear: build a repeatable sales engine as quickly as possible.
At the time, Sensorfact had product-market fit and a base of early customers, but the commercial motion didn’t scale.
Sales required visiting customers on-site, which felt intuitively right for ensuring hands-on success, but this imposed an invisible ceiling on growth. With support from the FORWARD.one team, the company transitioned to a remote-first, plug-and-play model.
The principle was straightforward: stop all traveling, ship a box with clear instructions, and empower customers to install and activate the sensors themselves. This transition eliminated site visits and operational bottlenecks. It allowed a hardware-inclusive product to scale with the efficiency of pure software, unlocking the growth that followed.
What set Sensorfact apart was its early focus on commercialization. They sold early. They learned fast. They scaled what worked.
By the time they raised capital, they weren’t asking for time to find a market. They already owned it.
The real bottleneck in scaling became hiring the right salespeople.
Sensorfact made an early decision that proved critical: build an internal recruitment team. Over time, the team understood exactly what worked inside Sensorfact: the energy, the commercial instinct, the cultural fit required to perform.
That system became a growth enabler.
There were moments where the company could have stretched too far, such as adding new products while considering expansion into new continents. That combination could have diluted focus.
They didn’t take that path and preserved their momentum through disciplined prioritization. In the end, scale came from building the right internal systems early and improving them over time.
FORWARD.one’s engagement extends far beyond capital. From day one, the focus is clear: turn technology into a real business, fast.
We supported where it mattered most. That included:
The best thing an investor can do in difficult moments is hand the founding team better tools and open the right doors, not walk through them on their behalf. Giving the wrong advice is often worse than giving none at all.
Boy de Jonge, Investment Manager at FORWARD.one
Sensorfact didn’t become relevant to ABB only at the moment of exit. That positioning was cultivated from much earlier in the journey.
The founders engaged with strategic players long before a transaction was on the table. Those conversations directly informed Sensorfact’s product roadmap, ensuring alignment with the needs of large industrial players.
At the same time, the market shifted. Rising energy prices and increasing ESG reporting requirements created urgency. Industrial players needed credible energy management solutions.
Sensorfact was already well-positioned.
The strategic fit with ABB was clear:
Sensorfact also unlocked a segment ABB couldn’t easily reach.
With 1,900+ customers, a pan-European footprint, and a plug-and-play product, ABB gained immediate access to a market that would otherwise take years to build.
Execution matters as much as technology.
FORWARD.one has its roots in strong IP and technical differentiation. Sensorfact proved that a highly capable founding team, executing relentlessly in the right market, can generate equal or greater outcomes. We now actively back execution-driven opportunities when we have conviction that the team is uniquely positioned to win.
European industrial SMEs are still massively underserved.
Sensorfact validated what we believed early: this segment is large, willing to pay, and structurally overlooked. Solutions that deliver clear, immediate ROI don’t need to be pushed. We continue to invest here because the best companies in this space are still being built.
Speed of value matters.
Sensorfact’s ability to demonstrate results within weeks minimized friction across the entire funnel. We now treat time-to-value as a first-order investment criterion. If you can’t explain the ROI simply and deliver it fast, someone else will.
Culture is a leading indicator.
Sensorfact had something harder to measure but impossible to miss. A company-wide energy where people moved fast, took ownership, and raised the bar for each other. This was set early by the founding team and reinforced through the first hires. The foundation built by the first 20 employees carried through as the company scaled. We now pay explicit attention to this. Because culture, more than anything else, predicts execution.
This journey validates key principles for funding early-stage industrial tech: prioritize sales traction over tech novelty, back exceptional teams, and accelerate commercial scalability.
FORWARD.one
Serious about performance.
