Today is a pretty special day for us at the Rude Baguette. If you’ve ever wondered why our website colors are Orange & Black, today might be the eye-opener you were looking for. The Rude Baguette launched two years ago with one small mission: to provide 100% transparency, visibility & access into the French Tech Market. Today, I feel confident when I say that there is no excuse not to know what’s going on in France these days – though even this week people asked me” what’s the appetite for startups in France?”
Two years ago, I’d twist in my chair as I rattled off a list of semi-successful second place winners. The not-LinkedIn, the not-YouTube, the not-Spotify. Today, I have all the ammunition I need to make people feel like there’s an entire market they’ve written off, so I thought I’d share with you some of the things that make the French Tech Market amazing:
Adobe snatches up French marketing platform Neolane for $600M
After the Yahoo-Dailymotion debacle, everyone thought it would be rough sailing in terms of acquisitions in France; however, just months afterwards, Adobe swoops up Neolane and sweeps the history under the rug.
Approaching €100 Million, Dailymotion to open office in the Land of the Rising Sun
While some would call Dailymotion’s story ’embarrassing’ (as someone did this week at Disrupt Berlin), I think that a profitable company worth €400 Million opening offices in Asia is probably not as embarrassing as some tech bloggers would make it out to be. Dailymotion has come out stronger than ever, signing an advertising deal with their would-be acquirers just this past month.
French VC Funds have raised over €1.4 Billion for new investment in startups in the last 13 months
Germany may be struggling to get VC funds, but France certainly has no trouble. Nearly every active VC fund has raised a new round – some of them admittedly smaller than their previous fund, but they are all still actively investing. This does not include the ever-active Index Ventures, Balderton Capital & other non-French funds who continue to invest in French companies.
Criteo IPOs for $2 Billion+ on the NASDAQ
France can stop talking about the great Business Objects (no offense, Bernard). France has a new IPO to talk about, and this one is being hailed as the AdTech IPO of the year.
France doesn’t need good press, they’ve got great companies
France’s biggest problem today is its bad reputation – something that is important, but i’d rather have a great product with bad press than have a bad product with great press. The truth is in the numbers, and all of the numbers that matter suggest that France, despite all of its current hurdles (and there are hurdles. I don’t pretend otherwise), is still producing million- and billion-dollar companies.
Today, two years into writing the Rude Baguette (1,354 articles, of which I have written 758), I am proud with how France has developed, but we won’t stop there. We quietly announced the Rüde Pretzel – Germany’s Startup Blog – this week, and I invite you all to follow us on Twitter & Like our Facebook Page as we get ready for our launch in the coming weeks.
We’ve got other great projects in the works – many of you have heard about our desire to build an easily accessible site with all the startups, founders, funds & investors that you need to know – and I promise you that it is coming. We’ll have more to talk about at the end of the year, and we’re going to keep bringing transparency, visibility & access to France, and the rest of Europe, for years to come.
My name is Liam Boogar, I am the CEO of Rude Media, and I have the best job in the world. Thank you all for the last two years, and I look forward to many more together.