In the vast room of the Communale, in Saint-Ouen (Seine-Saint-Denis), Nicolas Dufourcq, general director of Bpifrance, tested in partnership with Challenges a variation of the Big, the entrepreneurial high mass that he has organized every year for a decade at the Accor Arena. No politicians or CAC 40 bosses for this new event called HQ, but an immense crowd (more than 13,000 registered!)“neighborhood entrepreneurs”.
The opportunity to chat with Aïssata Fane, co-founder of Savane & Mousson restaurants, who wants to move up a gear through franchising. But also with Mido Soliman, founder of AtmosGear, who gives us a demonstration of electric roller skates of his invention (“protected by the Chinese by patents”) ; or even with Charlotte Culine, who wants “launch a media to confront and debate people who are completely opposed to each other”. Knowing a little about the sector, we asked her what format she was considering. And the young woman replied without blinking that it would of course be a “newspaper printed on paper, otherwise it’s not serious”.
During this invigorating afternoon with these young entrepreneurial athletes, on December 5, Challenges moderated a round table. To this one, Eva Olivier, from the Angelsquare platform, which connects start-ups and business angels, as well as the engineer Mohammed Haddou, co-founder and co-director of the freed entrepreneurs movement and of My Creo Academy, an accelerator And « booster » of companies which has spread from Aulnay-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis) to several cities in France.
Discussion topic: how to find money and break the « ceiling the distant » when you come from neighborhoods, and not, like many start-ups, from nice neighborhoods. The first test is that of the bank, because very often entrepreneurship begins with obtaining a loan, which is very far from obvious. There are techniques to access it, and it is sometimes less difficult than it seems.
You then have to ask yourself if it is really necessary to bring investors into your capital. It is often better to manage to be profitable quickly, like Savane & Mousson, in order to properly promote your company when you need to open up capital to accelerate its development.
When the day comes, you have to make a well-crafted PowerPoint, and prepare a very codified oral presentation — the pitch — which must be well prepared. Here again, the advice of the speakers is very useful. In any case, the message is simple: entrepreneurship is everyone's business, including in the neighborhoods.
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