Inflexion takes minority stake in Paris nail care brand Manucurist

European private equity firm Inflexion has taken a minority stake in Manucurist, the Paris nail care brand. The two sides describe the deal as a long-term partnership aimed at accelerating the brand's international growth and strengthening its innovation capabilities. No valuation or stake size was disclosed.

The stated priority is the United States, alongside a further retail rollout and continued growth in digital and marketplace channels. Inflexion said it will also back investment in the team, in systems and in new product development. The stated ambition is to turn Manucurist into a global leader in clean nail care.

Inflexion is a familiar name in beauty. The firm previously backed Medik8, the British vitamin A-focused skin care brand, scaling it internationally and across channels before its sale to L'Oréal in 2025. That exit is the strongest evidence yet of how the firm tends to work with founder-led consumer businesses.

Gaëlle Lebrat Personnaz, co-CEO and founder of Manucurist, said: "After ten years of innovation and expansion, I am proud and delighted to partner with Inflexion, who shares our vision and has a proven record of helping founder-led brands grow internationally."

She added: "We look forward to working together on the next stage of our journey." The ten years she references cover the period since 2016, when she took over the family business, rather than the brand's founding. Manucurist was established in 1996.

The origin story is a genuinely unusual one for a brand now courting American retailers. Manucurist began life in Paris in 1996 within a professional nail and beauty salon.

Personnaz spent several years in fashion at luxury houses, including Louis Vuitton, Prada and Yves Saint Laurent, before returning to lead it, experience that matters when a premium nail care line is positioned beside much more expensive product on the same shelf or in the same store.

The turning point came in 2019, three years after she took charge, when the brand launched Green Flash. That hero product is now sold across more than 40 countries worldwide, which gives the US push a foundation of existing distribution to build on rather than a cold start.

Tom Pemberton, partner and head of enterprise fund and consumer at Inflexion, said: "Manucurist is exactly the kind of business we like to back. A brilliant founder-led brand that has disrupted the market through product innovation and outstanding brand execution."

Inflexion is investing through its enterprise fund.

What Inflexion sees in the brand

The firm's pitch rests on a formula it has run before: a founder still in charge, a product that changed a category, and a market big enough to scale. Green Flash is Manucurist's answer to that formula, and its 40-country footprint is the proof point Inflexion can point to when courting US retail partners.

Clean nail care is the positioning Manucurist claims, and it is increasingly crowded. The brand's advantage is that the claim is based on a product launched in 2019 rather than a marketing repositioning, a detail that matters when wholesale buyers in the US weigh which label deserves shelf space.

The minority structure is itself worth noting. Personnaz keeps control and the co-CEO title, while Inflexion takes a seat at the table rather than the wheel. That is the same shape the firm used at Medik8 before L'Oréal came for the business in 2025.

What the partnership is for

The deal funds four things at once: retail expansion, digital and marketplace growth, hiring, and new product development. That breadth suggests a brand preparing to compete on distribution and product at the same time, rather than one simply chasing a store count in America.

Marketplace channels receive explicit mention, which points to the selling environment Manucurist expects in the US. A Paris brand entering America today contends with Amazon, direct-to-consumer sites and specialty chains simultaneously, and the partnership is provisioned for all three.

Personnaz's time at Louis Vuitton, Prada and Yves Saint Laurent matters here. A founder who has worked inside those houses understands how luxury retailers buy, and how a premium nail care line is positioned beside much more expensive product on the same shelf or in the same store.

Neither side has put a date on the US expansion or named the retailers in scope. The ambition is declared, the capital partner is in place, and the infrastructure to follow will be the measure of whether this minority stake does for Manucurist what the Medik8 investment did.

For Inflexion the deal extends a consumer playbook that already produced one beauty exit. The firm is now effectively betting the same approach works twice, this time in a category still defined by conventional polish and by the slow, costly shift toward formulations with less in them.

Manucurist has not disclosed revenue, profitability or the stake Inflexion acquired, and the absence of figures is itself a signal. A minority deal of this kind typically values the operational partnership over the headline number, leaving the brand's next retail announcements as the clearest measure of progress.

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Image: Manucurist