Professional Documents
Culture Documents
375
STARTUPERS
Profiles, trends and startupers
in their own words
375 STARTUPERS
Profiles, trends and startupers in their own words
FURTHER INFO
Table of contents
Methodology • 4
Introduction • 5
Who am I? • 10
A young man… • 11
… with a business school degree • 11
I met my co-founders on my course • 19
What do I do? • 24
B2C is sexy • 25
Widely varying target markets: a cause of potential creative disruption • 28
Conclusion • 33
Methodology
This study is based on two surveys of 375 startups applying for
NUMA’s business accelerator program: a Startups survey comprising
19 questions on the business project’s origin and environment and the
difficulties and needs of entrepreneurs; and an Entrepreneurs’ survey
made up of 21 questions on the sociological characteristics of startup
founders (age, education, etc.) and the way in which they work
on a daily basis. From this initial sample, we chose to remove some
40 foreign startups and 27 startups that have already attracted more
than €100,000 in funding, the idea being for us to focus solely on the
target group of our study: newly created French startups that have
yet to raise funding.
S
ince 2011, NUMA’s business accelerator pro- →→ The desire for a challenge and to make an impact is
gram has provided support for more than 100 the main reason why entrepreneurs start a business,
digital startups and received 2,930 applica- an indication of how they call the conventional enter-
tions. Some 80% of these companies are still prise into question.
operating and create hundreds of jobs each year. Hun- →→ First and foremost they are seeking market oppor-
dreds of startups have been successfully taken over, tunities, including openings in markets they know lit-
while some have continued their development by join- tle about. Business startup trends can therefore pro-
ing leading business accelerators abroad and others vide indicators of future creative disruption.
have achieved growth by attracting funding. →→ Entrepreneurs are mainly young men who meet at
an elite school (grande école) and have largely similar
In choosing their markets, striving for an impact and profiles.
expressing their desire to innovate, these new →→ In terms of economic models, they are mostly in-
business owners are driving French entrepreneurship spired by the success of other startups, which points to
forward. Getting to know them better will provide us the importance of a certain collective entrepreneurial
with a fresh way of interpreting economic and social imagination.
trends. So what do we really know about these →→ They have many needs, which mainly involve
entrepreneurs? Why do they decide to take the plunge knowledge of the market they are looking to break
and go into business? Where do the successful into, technical aspects and, above all, support with de-
businesses of the near and not-so-near future emerge cision making.
from? Just what are the emerging business models
and industries? And what are the obstacles facing We hope that this study serves as a guide for those who,
these entrepreneurs? What are their needs? in some way or other, have an interest in the world of
startups, are thinking about taking the plunge or who
While there has never been a shortage of analysis of new are looking to offer support to French entrepreneurs.
startups and the entrepreneurs behind them, the fact is If, in the coming months and years, private and public
there has been relatively little data available up to now. stakeholders engage in initiatives that are not mere
How can they get it right, and how can we help get funds posturing and white washing but instead have a
moving if we can only see the tip of the iceberg, namely genuine impact on entrepreneurs who are starting out,
the startups that have raised funding? In seeking to ad- then we will have achieved our aim.
dress that very lack of information, this study enables a
number of conclusions to be drawn on the economic Happy reading everyone.
and social nature of French entrepreneurship:
Why start my
own business?
What motivates
startup founders?
«Meeting challenges» and «changing the rules» are the two main motivations
for entrepreneurs.
It’s a challenge
highlight the rather dim view that entrepreneurs have
of conventional enterprise, a place where they feel re-
stricted and find it hard to bring their projects to frui-
71.9%
their interviews.
I want to be independent
55.6%
A market opportunity
into business.
I want to be famous
SELECTION CRITERIA
Why have you targeted your particular market?
SKILLS
Main skill possessed by founder(s)
34%
25%
24%
8%
6%
2%
S
imon, an MBA graduate, and his bro-
ther Thomas, who has a degree in FUN
FACT
Fine Arts, have already designed se-
veral digital reading apps. It was at
57%
NUMA in early 2015 that they met
The geek
How did you come up with the idea behind this project?
AUGUSTIN : What brought us together was the fact
we’re all pretty intellectual and bookish and we all
and the
have a thing for technology. We really have three
different profiles that complement each other well,
which makes it all pretty natural. We also wanted to go
on an adventure with friends. We’re more than just
colleagues.
designer.
SIMON : It was a couple of years ago and we were all
talking about starting our theses in economics,
philosophy and design. We decided instead to go into
business on our own because we had a passion for the
market and a desire to make a product that people
really wanted. Then there was also the fact that we
Who am I?
The typical startup
founder
35%
equality represents even more of a challenge than it
does anywhere else. Many explanations have been
given for this state of affairs (gender-based accounts
of what it is to go into business on one’s own, self-
censorship, and the under-representation of women
in some industries, etc.), all of which say as much
about government policy on gender equality as they
do about initiative in the business world. While, for
example, the women surveyed feel potential investors
take them a good deal less seriously than they do men,
young entrepreneurs are averse to any form of positive
discrimination in favor of women entrepreneurs (see
24%
«Women entrepreneurs» on page 13).
degree 14%
French startup founders are also highly qualified, with
46% possessing elite-school degrees, a significantly
11%
higher percentage than those with university degrees
(32%) or PhDs (4%). At 23%, engineering and bu-
siness school graduates are equally represented.
81%
19%
MALE/FEMALE
STARTUP FOUNDERS:
BREAKDOWN
Women
entrepreneurs
Flore Domitille
A
n ESSCA business science graduate, What’s it like to be a female entrepreneur in France?
Flore took up knitting while working DOMITILLE: There aren’t many women doing their
own startups at all, and there aren’t many specific
for a major fashion and luxury initiatives to encourage them either. Of the ones there
group in the Philippine capital of are, some might help us – but does it make much
Manila, the simple reason being that she sense to do things that help women only?
FLORE: Then there’s the fact that female entrepre-
needed a hobby to occupy her time whenever
neurs with young children aren’t eligible for day nur-
there was a power cut during the typhoon series! Some people think we’re housewives who can
season. The holder of a degree from the just down tools when we need to.
ESSEC Business School, Domitille picked up
And what do you think of French entrepreneurship
sewing from her grandmother. Prompted by
in general?
one of their conversations lamenting the lack DOMITILLE: What I think is positive is that France was
of instructive sewing tutorials on the a bit behind but that now you’ve got incubators pop-
internet, she came up with the idea behind ping up pretty much everywhere, and the media are
talking about it too. It’s become cool to launch your
Filoute. After launching the first version of own company and to be your own boss, which wasn’t
the site in September 2014 and following up the case five years ago.
two months later with a blog, Flore and FLORE: It goes without saying that we’re looking to
the international market. We’re close to the fashion
Domitille began selling patterns online in
world, although we’re more ‘ready to make’ than
March 2015. We asked the female tandem, ‘ready to wear’. It makes sense for us to project a
something of a rarity in a very masculine ‘Made in France’ image abroad.
environment, to share their entrepreneurial
experiences with us.
F
lorent was at engineering school when
he came up with an app that allowed
users with similar interests to link up
with each other.
After launching it, he teamed up with a class-
mate and founded Olea Park, a networking
application for professional events. For his
part, Matthieu spent 15 years working for a
company before deciding to team up with a
childhood friend and launch LoungeUp, a
cloud-based hospitality solution for the hotel
industry. As these intrepid entrepreneurs
show, age is no impediment to going it alone.
Profiles of Florent, the founder Olea Park,
and Mathieu, the founder of LoungeUp
Starting
up at 20
and 40
Florent
FLORENT : That’s very true! One of the first pieces of «Starting up a company
advice I’d give entrepreneurs is to not work too hard.
Olea Park has been exhausting and I lost a lot of is like running a marathon:
weight when we started out. We had to move fast and you have to stay the
battle it out with competitors who had more money
than us. You can’t exist like that for very long though. distance.»
It’s important to have a life, not work too late, get
some sleep and let your hair down.
FUN
FACT
45%
of entrepreneurs say beer is their
drink of choice
Matthieu
18 375 startupers: profiles, trends and startupers in their own words
TRAINING
What is your main degree?
MASTER’S
BUSINESS SCHOOL
38.6%
37.1%
31.6%
31.6%
30.3%
27.8%
22.8%
22.8%
22.7%
21.8%
15.9%
14.6%
12.3%
9.1%
7.9%
6.8%
5.3%
4.5%
3.8%
3.5%
3.4%
3.4%
2.3%
2.3%
2.3%
2.3%
1.8%
1.5%
0.8%
1.1%
1.1%
0.0%
GETTING TOGETHER
How do founders meet each other?
We were already friends 27%
At school 23%
By chance! 6%
We are parents 4%
Through entrepreneurial
networks 4%
We live together 2%
I met my co-founders
FUN
on my course FACT
62%
and colleges provide the source for entrepreneurial
partnerships in 27% and 23% of cases respectively, far
more than professional relationships (17%) and links
to the entrepreneurial world (5%), while family ties,
including spouses, account for 6% of the teams who
go into business together.
of entrepreneurs live together,
22% of which are married
(2% say it’s «complicated»).
Married couple
versus solo founder
Profiles of Aleksandra and Pierre,
the founders of Kwalito; and of Meryl,
the founder of La boîte qui cartonne
T
ogether for the last ten years, Pierre ALEKSANDRA : We also really want to do something
and Aleksandra have, for health rea- that has an impact on society. Making money is not
our main objective, though that could happen of
sons, always made a point of check- course. In our eyes, being an entrepreneur is a way of
ing the composition of the food they helping the world move forward.
buy. Their concern with what they eat led to
And how does being a couple fit into it all?
them create Kwalito, an app that scans the
ALEKSANDRA : It’s pretty lonely to be an entrepre-
barcodes of food products and tells users neur. You can’t really share what you go through every
everything they need to know about their day with your family because they don’t know what it
contents. Having attracted 9,000 users, involves. But in our case, we have to share it!
PIERRE : We manage it pretty well and we’re very orga-
Kwalito is now looking to raise funding. nized with our daily routine. We have children and we
get up at 7.20 in the morning to get them ready for
How does Kwalito work? school. Then we drop them off. That gives a structure
ALEKSANDRA : The idea was to enable people to to our day, which comes to an end when we give them
cross-reference their dietary requirements (glu- dinner and put them to bed. We get back down to our
ten-free, pork-free, vegan, etc.) with products. It’s a work afterwards, though. And we also make sure ev-
free-to-use app but our business model is 100% BtoB. eryone has time for themselves. I play sport on
We monetize the data with manufacturers and retail- Wednesday nights, Aleksandra does on Thursdays,
ers using a Google analytics model, albeit for food and we go out for a meal on Fridays.
products. Our aim is to track the market in real time. ALEKSANDRA : We met over ten years ago and we’ve
embarked on plenty of other major life projects
What does being an entrepreneur mean to you? together. If this one works out, it’ll be a professional
PIERRE : First and foremost, it’s a lot of work, but we and family success story. There is a lot of uncertainty
were working hard before anyway. Being entrepre- in terms of our income, though, because we’re both
neurs gives us the freedom to make the choices we involved in it and it’s not easy to juggle things with the
want. When we come up with an idea or put forward a children. You need to have broad shoulders to cope
solution, we don’t have to think about whether our su- with all that uncertainty.
periors are going to be on the same wavelength as us.
Pierre Aleksandra
M
eryl has been living in a 15m² You’re sailing your ship alone. How is it going?
flat in Paris since her student I think I’ve always known that I wanted to start up my
own company, create my own thing and be free. The
days and knows what it means thing is, I didn’t feel like doing it all on my own. When
to live in a confined space. I was studying I set up a students’ association that
On learning of the home storage services worked really well. It made me want to become an
entrepreneur. So I came up with the idea of «La boîte
available abroad and in the USA in particular,
qui cartonne», worked on the project and did my
she decided to adapt the concept for the market studies. I got a software developer in and got
French market. After studying Entrepreneur- the project up and running. The site was ready, and
ship at the Sorbonne and the ESCP, she then, the very next day I felt like calling a halt to
everything because I was on my own.
launched her own startup, «La boite qui car-
tonne», a service that has attracted around
500 users to date and has put as many box-
es into safe storage.
Meryl
FUN
FACT
24%
of entrepreneurs do not drink coffee
(47% drink between one and three cups a day
and 2% have more than ten)
What do I do?
Business models,
markets, trends
38.8%
on their own reflects the impact of major
entrepreneurial success stories such as Airbnb or
Blablacar, B2C companies that have proved an
inspiration to this new breed.
29.6%
business model and the ways in which they aim to
monetize their services, they will necessarily have to
evolve and «tilt» by switching from one model to
another. Tapping into NUMA’s services is a vital step,
therefore, in bringing projects to fruition. The
interviews conducted with entrepreneurs revealed
that after receiving the support of NUMA over a period
of several months, many of them then decided to take
their projects in a different direction, often switching
19.7%
Other
B2B
B2C
40.5%
Eg: Airbnb
Direct selling of products and services
30.3%
Sales commission
App model
Data selling
23.5%
Advertising
MONETIZATION
8.5%
Subscription
4.1%
Technology licensing
375 startupers: profiles, trends and startupers in their own words
17.0%
Payment for a period of use
4.8%
What kind of monetization is your project based on?
7.5%
Cross-selling/partnerships
375 startupers: profiles, trends and startupers in their own words 27
Making a go of it
without raising funds
Profile of Benjamin Hardy, the founder of Kawet
K
awet came into being shortly after The idea was to move on to the next phase without
the App Store opened its doors, bringing investors in. We wanted to go in with a group
so that we could develop more quickly and enable
starting life as a mobile app Kawet to grow. In the end, we joined an emerging
creation service targeted at group and we’ve kept our entrepreneurial adventure
professionals, this at a time when apps were going.
being introduced at companies via their
How has work changed on a day-to-day basis?
employees. Within a few years, and without I sleep better! With the admin stuff out of the way, the
having sought funding from venture stress continues: that ongoing search for the secret
capitalists, the startup was taken over. Its sauce that will let you scale up. Let me put it like this:
we were crossing the Atlantic in a little boat and an
founder, Benjamin Hardy, walks us through ocean liner came along and took us with it! All of a
the slightly unusual story behind it. sudden we have the security of knowing that at the
end of the month all the employees will get paid and
that the company will keep on going. With the buyout,
the roadmap was laid out for two years; all we had to
do was put the battle plans into action. Finally we
Where did the idea come from? could concentrate on execution.
We gave up our jobs to create applications, get some
training and sell them. We were in «agency mode». Why didn’t you try to attract investment?
Then we realized that we could make the app Raising funds requires a lot of time and energy, which
development process easier by creating specific tools, is something that you don’t always appreciate when
a kind of Wordpress but for applications. And so, you’re a young entrepreneur. Time and energy are rare
without even trying to make it happen, Kawet was commodities when it comes to startups. And then
born. The time we spent at NUMA really helped us there was the fact that after three years we were no
structure our business. Then we signed a few big longer willing to rip everything up and start again.
contracts before being taken over in 2013.
How do you feel about being an entrepreneur in France?
How did that go? Three years ago I would have said: ‘I want to go to the
We weren’t the average company. We were a group of US and set up my own company there, mainly because
friends and we all mucked in. It wasn’t your average of the ecosystem.’ But now I think it’s entirely possible
set-up and we put up the capital between us. Given all to achieve big things in France. The ecosystem has
that, raising funds was always going to be complicated. developed a lot and it’s all very positive.
A variety of target markets: There is hardly an industry into which young people,
a result of the potential for in their desire to explore every sector open to them, do
not venture. Given that market opportunities are a
disruption prime motivation for entrepreneurs, the industries
they choose to operate in are the ones they see as
Newly created startups operate in a very broad range offering the greatest potential for disruption.
of target markets. While French startups have enjoyed
well-documented success in high-profile industries The importance of lifestyle, leisure and consumer
such as health and biotechnology, sustainable goods explains the prevalence of B2C business models
development, and e-commerce, the fact is that new in these projects, as does the profile of entrepreneurs,
startups pursue business opportunities across a much who embark on projects that respond to their needs as
wider spectrum that includes design, lifestyle, young, city-based graduates.
professional services, media, leisure and social media.
SECTORS
What is the target project’s sector/market?
Lifestyle and leisure
Consumer goods
11.8%
Others
Fashion and textiles
Education
8.8%
8.4%
Software
6.4%
6.4%
6.4%
Financial services
5.4%
Charity/NGOs
4.7%
4.4%
Transport
Health
Energy
3.7%
Security
3.0%
2.4%
2.0%
2.0%
1.7%
1.7%
1.4%
FUN
FACT
Essentials such as offices, networking and project support are also very
important.
62% of teams take their decisions alone, without seeking external advice.
Market expert
would opt for a market expert, with another 29% choo-
sing a technical expert. At first sight, these responses
might seem contradictory, given that most startup
Technical expert
founders choose to go into business in what they per-
ceive to be growing markets. In reality, however, young
32.6%
entrepreneurs at the helm of newly created startups
have identified – often through a very innovative ap-
proach to a market – opportunities in markets in
which they lack specialist knowledge, hence the need
29.0%
for expertise. The creation of closer ties with major bu-
siness groups would offer startups a potentially useful
means of accessing this kind of expertise.
Core essentials
Business planning
9.6%
GOING IT ALONE
Assistance with the business plan
53%
47%
62%
34%
30%
17%
10%
Support French entrepreneurs and help them This study thus sends the message to the ecosystem’s
diversify stakeholders and to public and economic decision-
makers that there is a need to work together in actively
An entrepreneur’s main strength lies in his or her ac- promoting cross-fertilization in the entrepreneurial
ceptance of the simple fact that they cannot succeed world, as has been achieved in many initiatives in the
alone. On top of that, it is also true to say that there French ecosystem. To achieve this we need a blend of
can be no innovation without diversity. profiles, cultures and genders as well as a combination
of different generations, styles and economic
This study reminds entrepreneurs of the importance environments.
of not going it alone in their business ventures, a jour-
ney that involves no shortage of pitfalls. If entrepre- Reinvent the concept of work
neurs are to succeed, they must call on the support of
others, seek advice and back up their hunches with Ultimately, this study poses society a key question re-
the views of experts, of people well versed in the ways garding the future of work and in particular work in
in which all these fast-changing industries now ope- the business environment. As far as these young en-
rate in this the digital era. Successful startups are trepreneurs are concerned, creating a startup is their
founded on a broad and complementary range of way of expressing freedom, meaning and creativity.
skills, on a raft of business, technical and creative pro- The question is, why can they not find all this in
files. conventional business models? Work remains a
strong indicator of identity, and responding to the ex-
Encourage cross-fertilization between startups pectations, desires and inner motivations of this new
and conventional enterprise generation is a decisive challenge.
Just as young entrepreneurs need major corporations Startup founders have the freedom to explore beyond
and experienced elders to lend solidity and weight to the world of entrepreneurship. This study reveals the
their projects, so public and economic decision-ma- social mission that falls on entrepreneurs, who
kers – and here’s a first! – need young entrepreneurs to possess an unobstructed vision of a society in the
promote new ways of creating value (business models, process of being reinvented and who must seek to
products that respond to new consumer habits, and inspire key economic players and public decision-
organizational, management, thought and exchange makers.
systems, etc.). Incubators, intrapreneurship, reverse
mentoring and open innovation all exist with the aim A powerful, unstoppable movement is on the rise.
of making that creative mix possible. This is the cru- Let’s take it forward together!
cial consideration in shaping both a world that is eco-
nomically efficient and competitive and a harmonious
society.
EDITOR
Roland Berger NUMA
62-64, Rue de Lisbonne 39, rue du Caire
75008 Paris 75002 Paris
+33 1 53670-320 www.paris.numa.co
www.rolandberger.com
AUTHORS
Roland Berger NUMA
Charles-Edouard Bouée, CEO Marie-Vorgan Le Barzic, CEO
charles-edouard.bouee@rolandberger.com marie.lb@numa.co
Anne Bioulac, Partner Lucas Francou, Head of Strategy and Development
anne.bioulac@rolandberger.com lucas.f@numa.co
Nicolas Teisseyre, Senior Partner Elise Nebout, Head of Resources Strategy
nicolas.teisseyre@rolandberger.com elise.n@numa.co
INTERVIEWERS
Roland Berger NUMA
Anne Dujin Elise Nebout
anne.dujin@rolandberger.com elise.n@numa.co
MEDIA CONTACTS
Roland Berger NUMA
Agathe Lélu Arnaud Chaigneau
01 53 67 03 57 06 63 73 12 78
agathe.lelu@rolandberger.com arnaud.c@numa.co
PHOTOGRAPHY
Jacob Khrist
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We would like to thank all the startupers and startups
who agreed to appear in this study.
NUMA would also like to thank its partners:
Google for Entrepreneurs, BNP Paribas,
L‘Atelier BNP Paribas, CISCO
FURTHER INFO
About NUMA
Links & favorites
A major player in the digital ecosystem for the last ORDER AND
DOWNLOAD
15 years, NUMA brings together inventors, entrepreneurs www.rolandberger.com
www.375.numa.co
and startup founders with the aim of enhancing and
STAY CONNECTED
showcasing innovation. With offices in Paris, Moscow, www.twitter.com/
Bangalore and Casablanca, NUMA pursues three main RolandBerger
www.twitter.com/numaparis
goals: the event-driven nurturing and structuring of
LIKE AND SHARE
communities (it is the founder of the “Cantine Numérique” www.facebook.com/Roland
BergerStrategyConsultants
(“Digital Canteen”) and staged 1,500 events attracting www.facebook.com/
numaparis
80,000 people in 2015); the acceleration of startups
(having provided such a service to 104 of them since 2011, ABOUT
ROLAND BERGER & NUMA
and over 200 mentors); and the digital transformation of www.rolandberger.com
www.numa.com
companies (NUMA supports one third of CAC 40
companies in their digitalization and also set up the first
public/private multi-partner program) through open
innovation and experimentation.
375 STARTUPERS
Profiles, trends and startupers in their own words