It’s almost a tradition now. When June comes to an end, it’s time to take stock of Station F’s annual report. Inaugurated with great fanfare by Emmanuel Macron, the President of the Republic, in 2017, the XXL startup campus has become a real showcase for the rise of French Tech in the eyes of the entire world.
Since its opening, the former Halle Freyssinet, which covers 34,000 square meters, has seen thousands of entrepreneurs pass through its walls. And as Station F prepares to celebrate its 7th anniversary, the Paris campus team initiated by Xavier Niel has shared some data to better understand its impact.
65 nationalities represented on campus
From the beginning, Station F wanted to be very open to the whole world. Thus, entrepreneurs from all four corners of the planet have chosen to lay the first stones of their project within the Parisian incubator. Thus, 65 nationalities rub shoulders on a daily basis at Station F.
Unsurprisingly, the most represented nation after France is the United States (and this since the opening of the structure in 2017), which is ahead of Morocco, Italy, Tunisia and South Korea. It should be noted that more than a third of the residents of the French campus come from abroad. The latter can even sleep near Station F with the Flatmates coliving residence, located in Ivry-sur-Seine, a ten-minute bike ride from the star incubator of the French ecosystem.
If this human mix is already significant, the Station F team wants still further expand it. This is why it announced at the end of the year the launch of a program to support foreign startups that wish to develop on the European market. This was inaugurated with South Korea, a country that is a land of innovation par excellence, with global giants such as Samsung, LG and Hyundai.
39% of startups created thanks to unemployment benefits
With unemployment insurance reform looming on the horizon, the Station F team has been looking at the impact of these benefits on the entrepreneurs supported on its campus. 39% of the campus’ current startups were created thanks to unemployment benefits.
The structure team expected this figure to be 10% higher. “Part of this could be because we are seeing more repeat founders (currently over 50% of our population are repeat founders), which means they have an easier time raising money, can self -finance or are not eligible for these allowances”analyzes the latter.
In terms of aid that contributes to the take-off of the supported young shoots, 57% of the campus startups were supported by Bpifrance. A figure that does not include funding received from funds supported by Bpifrance. In total, 28% of Station F companies benefited from unemployment benefits and aid provided by Bpifrance. Here too, the structure’s team expected this portion to be more substantial.
More than a billion euros raised each year by the incubator’s startups
Capable of hosting up to 1,000 startups at the same time, Station F logically captures a significant portion of the investments made by venture capital funds. Thus, the companies on the Paris campus led by Roxanne Varza have together captured more than a billion euros per year over the last two years, which represents around 15% of the overall volume of the French ecosystem in 2023.
The year 2024 got off to a slightly higher start than the previous year, since Station F startups raised around 400 million euros over the first six months of the year, compared to 360 million in the first half of 2023. “It’s slightly less than in 2022, but we are quite confident in the ability of our companies to continue to attract investments”assures the campus team.
Unsurprisingly, it is startups positioned in AI that have raised the most funds recently. In 2023, this theme received four times more funding than any other theme. It is therefore not surprising that AI represents a quarter of the latest promotion of the Future 40, the index that aims to highlight the most promising young shoots hosted within the Paris campus. Note that the Station F team observes that cleantech startups, in reference to companies and technologies that encourage sustainable development and respect for the environment, are also on the rise.
But regardless of their sector of activity, the current young shoots supported by Station F hope to follow in the footsteps of companies like Hugging Face, Yuka, Interstellar Lab, 900.care or Stonly, which took off in the structure of the 13th arrondissement of Paris. More and more companies incubated at Station F are also catching the eye of tech giants, like Apple, Samsung or SAP, who have set their sights on some of them to strengthen themselves. Seven years after its opening, the attractiveness of the Parisian campus shows no sign of waning.
