[ENTREPRENEUR FOCUS] Duodeal - from PDF to deal: how to reinvent the sales quote

Can you introduce yourselves?

We are Aymeric and Maxime, two co-founders who met in Dubai - Aymeric was opening an office for a Paris-based startup (his first job on a VIE program), and Maxime was working in finance. We became friends and quickly realized we had complementary skills and a shared passion for sales and entrepreneurship.

After a few years there, we returned to France to launch Atawa, a startup that “uberized” event equipment rentals. We built the company from zero to €12 million in revenue over 7 years, entirely bootstrapped. It was a real training ground in sales, operations, and resilience (especially during Covid).

After selling Atawa to a European leader, we decided to start again from scratch to relive the early excitement of entrepreneurship, this time tackling a problem we had experienced at Atawa.

What is the concept behind Duodeal?

Duodeal is a SaaS platform that enables sales teams to create interactive sales pages instead of PDF quotes. Concretely, instead of sending a static file as an attachment, sales reps use AI to generate their offer extremely quickly and benefit from a built-in coach to optimize their messaging and close deals more effectively. The client receives a link to a branded, immersive web page that brings together presentations, videos, dynamic pricing, and a direct collaboration space.

Three things happen:

1. The client enters a branded digital space
   No more cold PDFs. They see your brand and your offer presented with as much care as your best sales page.
2. You gain visibility
   Who opened the quote? For how long? Which sections did they read? You know exactly when and how to follow up -  based on data, not intuition.
3. You close together
   The client can comment, ask questions, and interact directly on the proposal. A shared space, a conversation, a signature.

A commercial proposal is not a pre-invoice. It’s your best sales tool.

How did you come up with the idea?

At Atawa, we were sending quotes as PDFs generated from Google Sheets. It quickly became a real limitation - we were losing time, making pricing errors, and most importantly, our quotes did not reflect the quality of what we were selling. We were offering premium event services with Excel tables.

We looked for a tool on the market that matched our vision: an online space where the client could experience the proposal, not just read a document. Nothing existed. So we built it internally.

The result was immediate: our clients started asking where they could get this tool. That’s when we realized we had something valuable. When we sold Atawa, the decision was obvious: turn this internal product into a solution for all sales teams.

Where are you today? What are you most proud of?

We are in the commercial launch phase. The product is live, our first clients are using Duodeal in production, and we have a solid roadmap backed by 50+ customer interviews and several months of beta testing with five companies across different industries.

What we’re most proud of is starting this new adventure together, with the ambition to build a company that reflects who we are - our values and our shared vision.

We also spent a lot of time defining Duodeal’s “Why”: “To design meaningful business moments so that people can connect, grow, and close deals with trust and confidence.”

Why did you take part in the IÉSEG Entrepreneur Prize 2026?

The best way to test a project or an idea is to talk about it, pitch it, and confront it with an audience. The IÉSEG Entrepreneur Prize was an opportunity for us to present our project and launch our v1.

If our entrepreneurial journey inspires even one IÉSEG student to start their own venture, we will have achieved everything.

What are your goals for the coming years?

Short term: Acquire our first clients in France, mainly in sectors where quotes are a critical sales tool.

Mid-term: International expansion. We already have clients in several countries and want to accelerate quickly.

Long-term ambition: Become the #1 reflex for sales teams of 10 to 100 people. But above all, to build a company where every team member is proud to grow and share this journey with us.

Anything else you’d like to share?

We are convinced that a company’s success does not depend on the initial idea, but on the strength of the founding team. Sharing a common vision and values allows you to build an authentic company capable of weathering cycles. With the right partners, an idea can evolve or pivot.

Bootstrapping: the school of discipline and profitability. Atawa was our masterclass in management: with an initial investment of just €15,000 each, we grew the company to €12M in revenue and 30 employees. This culture of independence, far from the traditional fundraising model, taught us to turn every euro into a growth lever. It’s this same operational rigor that we are now embedding into Duodeal’s DNA.