France is emerging as a country with a booming tech ecosystem. A recent report showed that the country's startups raised nearly 1 billion euros in 2015, catching up to other European tech startups landscape and also the country's allies such as the UK and Germany.
A report from Tech.eu provided the insight of France's tech ecosystem by analyzing the bigger trends in the French funding and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) market in 2015. The report comprehensively analyzed accurate statistics gathered by the team as they track all of the funding round and exits in Europe. The team has monitored numerous sources and collect relevant data for a full year.
Geektime revealed more about the content of the report. Overall, the country's tech startup landscape is catching up in venture capital with nearly 1 billion euros secured in 2015. The report shows that the majority of tech industry activity is happening in the country's capital Paris, accounting for about 80 percent of all startup funding across the country. Other remarkable cities with emerging presence of tech startups are Lille, Montpellier and Toulouse.
The statistics also show that domestic investors are still driving the country's funding and M&A deals. The most active investors were French investors, even though more than half of France's top 20 rounds involved a foreign investor. Also, what the report noted as France's strength and its weakness, is that nearly 40 percent funding went through seed rounds. The next largest funding came through Series A.
Even though France is catching up in overall venture capital, established in a "distant fourth position" to Israel, the UK and Germany, the country's M&A dropped from 18.6 billion euros in 2014 to about 900 million euros. The year 2015 had also seen only on French IPO for Showroomprive and there were no 1 billion euros exits.
The achievements in 2015 lead up to a good projection for 2016. As the report puts it, "France will experience a significant increase in both the amount of investments and total funding volumes in 2016." The government is also now paying more attention to the tech landscape in the country. According to TVN, the country's president François Hollande has had meetings with prominent tech entrepreneurs as the deputy finance minister for digital innovation Fleur Pellerin is aiming to turn France into one of Europe's premier hubs for tech startups.
A recent report showed how France is establishing its place as an emerging landscape for tech startups. The country's startups raised nearly 1 billion euros in 2015, putting itself in the fourth place to Israel, the UK, and Germany in the Europe.
Join the Conversation