How is it to be a Tech Entrepreneur in France? Response to @rudebaguette and @betabeat’s posts cc @fdestin @liamboogar

Posted on February 7, 2012 by admin

There was this post first on BetaBeat: French Startups Take Refuge in New York, then Liam Boogar from RudeBaguette wrote : Six Lies Ilan Abehassera told about France

Well, here is my response to Liam, since I don’t want to be misinterpreted here. I am a big believer in France’s talents, I just don’t think France is doing enough to promote Entrepreneurship

I posted this as a comment on RudeBaguette too.

 

Liam,

First, let me start by saying that even though I left France a long time ago, I am still tightly connected to the startup scene there, and I am friends (yes, real friends) with a bunch of prominent french startuppers. I am nobody to give a judgement on France’s politics about startups and entrepreneurship, so most of my arguments are actually coming a lot of endless discussions I had with them along the past 3/5 years.

My point definitely isn’t that we don’t have fantastic entrepreneurs in France, because we do, and I am not only thinking about the big names in Tech that we keep mentioning over and over (Vente Privee, Meetic, PriceMinister…), I am talking about the new generation of tech entrepreneurs emerging in France (you mention some of those startups in #6).

Most of them are brilliant, they really are. But bottom line, really few of them end up building tech giants. Why? Because of some of my points. I love France, and I wish this can become a fantastic country to start a tech company (not talking about other industries), but it still has a long way to go as Fred Destin says.

Some of what you describe as “lies”, are actually incorrect, so there we go :

French startups in NYC : Those 4 that she’s quoting are the most well funded ones I guess. But I know many others: Odealarose, Peerform, LesHoraires, Topi… And I am meeting with a bunch of others every single week. She probably could have interviewed other entrepreneurs though. Agreed on this.

#1 : Come on, do you really believe that France promotes entrepreneurship, and has been doing so for a while? Pdt Sarkozy is hosting geeks for LeWeb, and is announcing his willingness to promote entrepreneurship 6 months before the presidential campaign, makes France a pro-entrepreneur country? Really? France is a country where it’s still much easier to be an employee than an Entrepreneur. They do offer grants like Oseo and others, which is a fantastic initiative (that we don’t have in the US btw), but on a day to day basis, being an Entrepreneur in France is tough. 

#2 : Like you said, it differs. I’ve witnessed all kinds of situations, but it seems to be a rather longer process that anywhere else in Europe still. As a point of comparison, incorporating a company in the US, takes 30mns online on MyCorporation.com

#3: I was talking about taxes on salaries. It was taken out of its context. Hiring a talent in France is very expensive.

#4: small pool of hiring talents, never said that (we talked on the phone for this interview, so tough to remember everything), and that’s not true. France is full of fantastic engineering talent for example. For the record, almost all of our engineers at Producteev are French.

#5: Again, sorry, but you know it’s not true Liam, otherwise you don’t talk to enough entrepreneurs in France. Getting rid of bad employees is almost mission impossible in France. Trial period… Come on. Isn’t it easy to fake it for 3 months to get your CDI? This is the biggest entrepreneur’s pain IMHO.

#6: Again, out of context. I actually asked the question to the journalist if she could mention one French tech startup, and she couldn’t. Not my fault. And among those startups, some are indeed doing well. It wasn’t my opinion, just a question to a US journalist.

The Loic of the East: I do admire what Loic has accomplished here in the US, but first, I’m just on my first startup and don’t have any success under my belt yet, and second, everything I am doing communication wise, is to promote my company (not myself, not saying Loic is btw), and to help other French startuppers better understand the ins and outs of the US market, because I’ve gone through this.

 

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