Being french and living in the US, I have a question: Do you feel like the french system (hard to hire/fire, etc) helped in that failure ?
And do you feel like if you had started outside of Europe, you could have raised 10x what you did and maybe found a what to become sustainable ? (even if you say that you don't need money)
In graduate school I had a colleague from France echo a similar observation - "In America you go out and raise money for a business idea, fail completely, lose all the money, and then go out and do it again. In France you'd be seen as a failure and never get another chance again."
Concerning mindset, I think there's an even bigger cultural trait that's holding back French entrepreneurship: a complete absence of a "culture of failure".
By and large, French culture is one of fixed mindset. Mistakes/errors/failures reveal one's limitations or flaws, and aren't perceived as an opportunity to learn and grow. This starts very early and is very much baked in to the structure of schooling.
On the flip-side, this seems to be slowly changing. At the very least, people are aware that the US does this differently, and there seems to be some interest in effecting change.
Fiscality has never stopped anyone starting things. Issues actually appear on the long run only.
Comparing US versus UK versus FR is a non-sense if your ambitions are global. You can start anything in France. Money is cheap, Engineers 3x less expensive than UK or US. And there are plenty of people unemployed looking for a great purpose. It's a wonderful play-field for someone ambitious.
- the culture is not the same as the US. French people tend to be very financially risk-averse
- the VC eco-system in France exists but it is trash
- people who have the skills to create startups in France tend to do it outside of France because they will have access to better capital/labor markets (for example, DataDog and Docker both have french founders)
Unfortunately this may not be sustainable in the long run unless more people create new businesses in France, and starting a business here seems daunting due to the expense for the social and welfare system. The more I learn about the welfare system in France though the more I believe that building a profitable business here is possible, but it takes an understanding on how to work within the system. The problem is that there will continue to be cheaper options by setting up shop outside of France and that will continue to be an attractive option to low-margin businesses.
We often hear stories on how hard it is to start a business in France. As a French, I'd like to hear how easy it is in other countries (UK, US?). For example, what are the costs, the amount of paperwork...
I grew up in France; gradutated from University (so not from French Ivy League known as "Les Grandes Ecoles").
I'm currently in a consulting position and tried to launch several startups-ideas at the end of my MS degree with the "Auto-Entrepreneur" status and it was very difficult to find investors because french people are very pessimistic by nature and the atmosphere created by the state and the media is really oppresive.
It means that if you fail (and I failed), people around you will break your mood down (very hard to handle that).
You need to find your team of talented people who will be ready to use their own money to reduce costs.
It's almost impossible to recruit someone you don't personnaly know without a large amount of cash.
Splitting equity seems to be not attractive enough with french tech engineers...
The one and only advantage in France is that you can restart your life because you can easily avoid indebtedness in case of failure.
France is one of the most frustrating countries a young entrepreneur could ever work in. As soon as you find some way to bypass the rigidity of the system to create something new, to make life easier for people and actually create wealth, the octopus grows another arm to strangle you with. It just sucks the energy right out of you...
The UK may have its problems, but it's a breath of fresh air by comparison. It's no wonder 600,000 French people now live in London (and that's just the ones who registered at the embassy).
As a French, it saddens me a bit to say that but you also missed one point: culture. My background includes some grad school experience at a top French university and then at a top US university. One big difference, which became even more obvious to me after I crossed the Atlantic, is that there is (almost) no hustle culture in France.
Make fun of the stupid apps and the copycats but so many undergrads at my American alma mater were trying something, and that is already so much more than what I saw in France. I have seen some undergrads in America make serious money through their side projects and big companies are more often seen as a stepping stone towards something else. In France, the holy grail is to get a CDI (permanent employee contract) at a big company and that’s often pretty much it. They can be great employees but making money within a structure simply does not require the same resourcefulness. I don't know if the culture is contagious once you arrive in a country, or if universities attract different profiles (probably both), but I thought it was also interesting to note that the immigrants were often resembling the locals in both countries.
In my opinion, even the best version of Macron’s plan is bound to produce underwhelming results. While French taxes and bureaucracy might not help entrepreneurship, I do not think that’s why France isn’t a startup nation. Rather, it’s the fact that France isn’t a startup nation that explains why bad policies and bureaucracy have been tolerated for so long. Understand me well: my comment is the opposite of an attempt to diminish the accomplishments of French entrepreneurs, who exist and face higher administrative hurdles than their American counterparts, but is simply written to share some observations on campus culture and entrepreneurship at two top schools.
>Many said expanding a company in France can be hard because of stringent employment laws and the country's small market.
I'm not too sure on employment laws in France. For an entrepeneur Sarkozy has made some pretty good concessions as far as tax obligations. Probably not as good as what you could do get in the US, but better than what it was. Previously, to start a company you had to have the entire year's taxes paid up front, before you made a penny.
And you have access to the entire EC. So I don't know what small market is. Unless they mean french-speaking only. But even French companies know they can't rely on all of France to carry their market so much more is spent on localization of applications.
One weakness the french do have is an unwillingness to take risks and accept failures. Even in 2010 a lot of college grads are still looking for jobs with the state. But the entire system is stacked against them that way. My first apartment, I had to get a "caution" from my job. A guarantee that if I couldn't pay the rent the company would. For a small startup, this would be impossible unless all your employees came from rich families.
As an American living and working in France, this sounds like a scenario where France would love to have the results and benefits of a startup boom, but they don't want to take the necessary steps to enable it. Having a bunch of free money or easy visas are actually not what will cause a boom. France is notorious for never-ending paperwork and administration, and it's true. It's like trying to swim in molasses. You can do it. No one is "stopping" you. But eventually you just get too tired and give up, and go to the cafe and enjoy life. But hey, yeah let's make France attractive to startups and catch some of those taxes and world attention. But we don't want to change anything about our culture or regulations, so we can give give out a bunch of money, right? That will get people to flock here, make billion euro companies, and we'll reap the benefits. That's what it seems like to me.
France is a serious problem case. Getting funded there from official sources depends more on your pedigree than anything else. Also, the funding there tends to come with some serious strings attached. If I were to operate a start-up in France I would look outside of France for funding.
> 2. I'd argue that it'll take a long time to set up a company anywhere when you don't know the customs of the country. Of course, language is an additional barrier, but I'm pretty sure I'd manage to set up a startup quickier in France than in the US, just because I'm French. Same for you in your own country. Big deal.
This is phenomenal news for France! After having married a French woman, lived in France and subsequently we moved back to the U.S., I realized how far behind France was in the entrepreneurial game when compared to the States. Yet, there are really brilliant people in France! These measures are definitely a step forward. I will be interested to see if they speak about it on Le Grand Journal this evening. Once we have children, we have thought about moving back to France because the education system is so good but, we have been very pessimistic about doing so because entrepreneurship is so looked down upon.
Unfortunately, I don’t think Hollande’s efforts are going to have too great an effect long-term. My experience has indicated that the French system is set up in such a way as to reward people who don’t take any risks. It is not simply the banking system or taxes that is to blame. There is a cultural stigma against taking risks that does not exist in the States. The education system is at least 100x better than the best schools in America, yet good test score count for very little when it comes to the hustle required in entrepreneurship, much less web based entrepreneurship where everyone is brilliant and hard working. There is simply not the same commitment to innovation. I often felt that I had made a faux pas when I lived in France and spoke about different business ideas at dinner or a party.
Unfortunately, politics is not the only problem holding the many brilliant people in France back from innovating and changing the world. In France, it is not culturally acceptable to want to be like Elon Musk.
The main problem with France is the employment laws. Start-ups in other countries don't have this problem to the same extent. The secondary problem is that there is a lot of capital floating around in France with 'strings attached', great to get you going, but a huge problem later on.
That's so fucking backwards. France was, is and will remain a shit place for any serious entrepreneur. Literally no single unicorn founder from the US would have satisfied these old fashioned conservative anti-progression requirements.
This will be interesting to follow. France is a great place, but needs to work with their rules around taxes and social obligations from employer to employee. It is too scary to be an entrepreneur in France and there is a lot of overhead. I hope they find a good model for startups since the country needs that energy and has the talent.
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