Paris (AFP)
The Minister of Economy Bruno the Mayor and the Secretary of State for Digital Cédric O must announce Friday an additional plan of more than 600 million euros to support French Tech, shaken by the coronavirus crisis, learned the AFP from government sources.
This program complements a first rescue plan of 4 billion euros announced at the end of March.
Funded mainly through the Investments for the Future Program (PIA), this plan includes the creation of an investment fund, managed by Bpifrance, intended in particular to defend French start-ups, weakened by the crisis , from the appetite of foreign predators.
This "French Tech Sovereignty" fund will initially be endowed with 150 million euros, its size being able to be increased "according to needs" to more than 500 million next year.
Some 335 million euros must at the same time help finance start-ups, by replenishing existing mechanisms where necessary: strengthening cash between two fundraisers (80 million), loans for "promising" start-ups (100 million) , support for innovative companies (120 million), assistance for innovation (20 million) and artificial intelligence (15 million).
Several "support measures for the maturation and incubation of technological projects" intended "not to compromise the creation of new start-ups" must at the same time represent an envelope of 180 million.
To accelerate the development of digital uses, the State Secretariat for Digital Affairs will launch by the end of July an inventory of legislative and regulatory "locks" likely to be lifted.
Information actions will finally be launched to support the recruitment of young graduates in Tech.
"Technology companies will be at the heart of the economic reconstruction of our country and its power. Supporting them is an imperative. This is the ambition that we carry with this support plan", say MM. The Mayor and O in a presentation consulted by AFP.
France now has 10,000 to 20,000 start-ups, employing more than 100,000 people. Before the crisis, according to the government, they were expected to create nearly 25,000 net jobs in 2020, or between 10% and 20% of the total.
© 2020 AFP