After a particularly successful 2018 edition, which saw La French Tech make up the second largest delegation of startups at the CES after the United States, Business France will once again be running the French Tech Pavilion, with support from Orange, BNP Paribas, INPI, All Circuits, STMicroelectronics, Arrow, Air France, Miliboo, Captronic, Bolloré Logistics and France Brevets.
Twenty-six startups from among more than 330 French Tech companies were selected by Business France and a panel of experts* to present their innovations. They were chosen based on three criteria: the innovative nature of their products, their ability to take full advantage of their presence at the CES and their potential for commercial success.
In addition, Business France is supporting around 10 “Family & Friends” startups,[1] including Lunii, Team 8, Linto and Camtoy.
“When it comes to the IoT and consumer tech, the CES is the number one show for anyone who needs to gain visibility among journalists, potential customers or investors. Las Vegas sets the tone for the year’s major technological trends and can serve as a very powerful springboard for a well-prepared startup,” explains Éric Morand, Tech & Services Director at Business France.
“However, this is just one stepping stone and it is important to successfully conduct every stage of the market launch process to fully harness the buzz created. That is the true purpose of our support strategy, which helps startups grow and increase their sales, but also to find distributors and partners, specifically through our immersion programs and targeted actions like the initiative led in conjunction with the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York last spring.”
This year, Business France has also focused its efforts on bringing together a large number of startups supported by France’s regional authorities.
Team France Export: a program driven by our regions
Uniting the efforts of France’s regions forms part of the country’s new international trade strategy. The objective is to boost efficiency by setting up “Team France Export” both at national level and under the auspices of each regional authority.
Business France has combined the strengths of nine French regions (Bourgogne-Franche-Comté, Bretagne (Brittany), Centre-Val de Loire, Hauts de France, Ile de France (Paris region), Normandie, Nouvelle Aquitaine, Occitanie and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur) at the CES in 2019, enabling “Team France Export” to bring around 160 startups to the show, all under the French Tech banner.
“With the creation of Team France Export, in which the country’s regions play a crucial role, it was very important that we harness France’s collective energy at an event of the CES’s magnitude, an approach that embodies this new team’s philosophy and our concerted strategy to support our nation’s businesses,” points out Christophe Lecourtier, CEO of Business France.
[1] “Family & Friends” startups are firms that have already received a helping hand from Business France and will be taking advantage of this support again at the CES in 2019.