Efficiency onlyOff-the-shelf productEstablished, AI retrofitted

lemlist

LEMPIRE SAS, Paris (RCS Paris 823 475 082) ·www.lemlist.com· As of: 2026-07-30

Runs cold outreach across email, LinkedIn, phone and SMS as a single sequence, manages the sending mailboxes and their deliverability, and writes replies, opt-outs and booked meetings back onto the contact record.

Our verdict

A sequencing tool makes nobody distinguishable, because competitors use the same category and often the same vendors. But running cold outreach without that layer means losing control over deliverability, opt-outs and reply attribution, and that is where the expensive mistakes happen, because personal data of non-customers is being processed. So it is mandatory equipment: it prevents regression, it does not create an edge.

Who it fits

Solo

suitable

The entry plan is a flat 69 US dollars a month and does not cap the number of users. One person can send 50,000 emails a month without doing any seat math.

Mid-market

suitable

As soon as LinkedIn, calling and SMS come into play, the model switches to 109 US dollars per user per month. For a five-person sales team that stays predictable, as long as credit-based enrichment does not turn into a second line item.

Enterprise

suitable with caveats

Single sign-on with SAML and custom roles only appear in the quoted Enterprise plan from five users up. More serious: the vendor states in writing that it will not sign a customer's own data processing agreement, which routinely halts a corporate vendor review.

Buy, switch or build

Off-the-shelf

Sequences inside the CRM you already have

Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive ship their own sequence features. The advantage is that contact, history and revenue stay in one system, and no second store of personal data appears. The price is a weaker delivery layer: mailbox rotation, warm-up and reply detection are side features there, not the core job.

AI-native

Research agent plus a separate sending layer

Tools like Clay or a self-built agent research each contact and write the copy, while sending then runs through a specialised service. This lifts the hit rate noticeably, but it does not replace the delivery layer, it presupposes it. Buying both from one vendor saves a seam. Splitting them buys replaceability.

Build it yourself

Your own sending over a mail API

Technically this is not a big build: Amazon SES, Postmark or Resend do the sending, and your own store holds contacts, steps and replies. What makes it expensive is not the sending but everything beside it: opt-out logic, bounce handling, mailbox rotation, reply detection, and the record of who objected and when. Worth it only when outbound is part of the product itself.

Our advice

  • Solo: Buy the entry plan, do not build.
  • Mid-market: Buy, but model the credit spend before signing an annual deal.
  • Enterprise: Settle the refused customer DPA with legal first, then decide.

Who is behind it

Staying power: Established

The legal entity has been on the Paris commercial register since November 2016 and operates without venture funding. The Claap acquisition in October 2025 was, by the company's own account, an eight-figure deal paid from its own cash, which points to a load-bearing revenue stream.

  • Legal entity and registration: LEMPIRE SAS, RCS Paris 823 475 082, registered on 1 November 2016, registered office 128 rue La Boétie, 75008 Paris · Source · As of 2026-07-30
  • Annual recurring revenue: around USD 35 million according to trade press, as of October 2025 · Source · As of 2026-07-30
  • Funding: no venture capital; the acquisition of Claap in October 2025 was an eight-figure deal funded from its own means · Source · As of 2026-07-30
  • Customer count: more than 20,000 companies according to trade press, as of October 2025 · Source · As of 2026-07-30
  • Audit report: SOC 2 Type 2 listed in the public trust portal, along with 57 documented controls · Source · As of 2026-07-30

Cost of leaving: Moderate

Contacts and campaign results can be pulled out as CSV and through the API, but only campaign by campaign since the cross-campaign bulk export was removed. What does not come with you is the actual value: the warmed-up sending reputation of the mailboxes, the reply history in the shared inbox, and the sequence logic. Then there is the contract: the terms state that an annual minimum fee is neither cancelable nor refundable, and unused credits expire.

Regulation and data

Data processing agreementown document, signable electronically; customer-supplied agreements are refusedThe vendor provides its own Article 28 data processing agreement for electronic signature and states plainly that it will not sign agreements supplied by customers.Source · As of 2026-07-30
Storage locationOVH, FranceThe terms name OVH, with its address in Roubaix, as the host. The privacy policy states the servers sit exclusively inside the European Union. The help centre narrows this to France and the European Economic Area.Source · As of 2026-07-30
Subprocessorsno public subprocessor listThe terms refer anyone wanting the subprocessor list to a request to the data protection officer. The only processors named publicly are website and marketing services such as Intercom, HubSpot, Segment and Amplitude, not the services behind the application itself.Source · As of 2026-07-30
Third-country transferunclearThe help centre says no personal data is processed outside the European Economic Area. At the same time the privacy policy keeps standard contractual clauses ready for transfers, and the terms permit the use of Amazon Web Services. Those three statements do not line up, so the question belongs in the contract.Source · As of 2026-07-30
Training on customer dataunclearNeither the terms nor the privacy policy state whether campaign copy, incoming replies or contact data feed model training. Since the product ships AI features for research and copywriting, the question is open and belongs in the contract talks.no source given · As of 2026-07-30
Retention and deletionup to 3 years after the account is closedThe privacy policy names at most three years after account closure for service data, and the statutory limitation period, typically five years, for evidentiary data. The terms promise deletion of confidential material within thirty days of termination but explicitly carve out backup copies.Source · As of 2026-07-30
CertificationsSOC 2 Type 2The public trust portal lists a SOC 2 Type 2 report and 57 documented controls. No ISO 27001 certificate of the vendor's own is listed there. The terms mention ISO 27001 merely as an example of industry-standard controls, which is not evidence of certification.Source · As of 2026-07-30
EU AI Act, Article 50the vendor classifies its own AI feature as a limited-risk systemThe terms describe Lead Finder explicitly as a limited-risk AI system. That is precisely the category the Article 50 transparency duties attach to, which take effect from August 2026. How the vendor implements those duties is not stated.Source · As of 2026-07-30
Audit loggingunclearThe trust portal lists internal controls for change and access management. Whether the customer can inspect and export an auditable log of access and changes, and in which plan, is not publicly substantiated.no source given · As of 2026-07-30

What it really costs

Entry price

The Email plan is a flat 69 US dollars a month, 55 on annual billing, and includes unlimited users plus 50,000 emails a month. The Multichannel plan costs 109 US dollars per user per month, 87 on annual billing.

Source · As of2026-07-30

What gets expensive

In three places. First on channels: LinkedIn, calling and SMS only start at Multichannel, and there every user counts separately. Second on credits: one credit costs 0.01 US dollars, a verified email address costs five credits, a phone number twenty, an intent signal between twenty and four hundred. Enriching 5,000 phone numbers adds 1,000 US dollars. Third on the contract: the terms make the annual minimum fee non-cancelable and non-refundable, and unused credits expire without compensation.

What it displaces

  • Mail merge out of a personal inbox
  • A spreadsheet as the follow-up reminder
  • Separate tools for email, LinkedIn and calling

Interfaces

  • REST API for campaigns, contacts and activities
  • CSV export per campaign and per contact list, no combined export across several campaigns
  • Webhooks for replies, opens and unsubscribes
  • Integrations with HubSpot, Salesforce and Pipedrive
  • Browser extension for LinkedIn

At Convios: Not used by us

Not used in our own operation. The findings come from the vendor's public documents and from dated trade press, not from first-hand experience.

Matching methods

Evidence

  1. 1.Plan prices, sending limits, credit costs and Enterprise minimum size · As of 2026-07-30
  2. 2.Legal entity, OVH as host, retention, non-cancelable annual minimum fee, classification of Lead Finder as a limited-risk AI system · As of 2026-07-30
  3. 3.Server location in the European Union, retention periods, standard contractual clauses for transfers · As of 2026-07-30
  4. 4.Storage exclusively within the European Economic Area on servers in France at OVH · As of 2026-07-30
  5. 5.Own data processing agreement for signature, customer agreements are refused · As of 2026-07-30
  6. 6.SOC 2 Type 2 report and 57 documented controls in the public trust portal · As of 2026-07-30

Last reviewed: 2026-07-30byDr. Oliver Gausmann, Convios GmbH

Details out of date? Let us know.

Work through this method with an AI