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EU-Startups Summit: 20% Discount

Join Europe’s top startups, investors, and innovators for 2 days of networking, inspiration, and learning. The next edition will take place on April 24-25, 2025, in sunny Malta. Bringing up to 2500 attendees, it will be bigger and better, with more exciting opportunities and connections than ever before! Whether you’re launching your first startup or scaling a unicorn, this is the event you won’t want to miss. 🦄

Use the code FRENCHTECH20 to get 20% off tickets until April 2!

Headlines

🗞️ Pigment launched a suite of AI agents—Analyst, Planner, and Modeler—designed to revolutionize business planning and performance. These agentic AI capabilities work alongside teams, automating tasks like scenario modeling, planning workflows, and generating real-time insights. This move marks a significant shift toward a digital workforce, enhancing productivity, decision-making, and agility. The announcement comes amid strong business growth for Pigment, signaling their ambition to lead the next generation of enterprise planning. Ultimately, the company aims to enable truly autonomous and intelligent business operations. "This is an industry-first move toward a digital workforce, where agents work alongside teams to increase productivity, improve decision-making, and enable better business outcomes," CEO and co-founder Eleanor wrote on LinkedIn. "We’re expanding the horizons of what businesses can accomplish, moving one step closer to truly autonomous, empowered planning and performance." | LinkedIn, Pigment, FirstMark

🗞️ Aldebaran Robotics, the French company behind the humanoid robots Nao and Pepper, is facing a severe financial crisis and has been placed in receivership as of February 17, 2025. Following earlier bankruptcy proceedings in January, the company is now urgently seeking new investors to secure its future. Internal sources reveal that Aldebaran may lay off over 70 of its 164 employees, although management has not confirmed this number. The crisis follows what employees describe as the "brutal abandonment" by its main shareholder, Germany’s United Robotics Group, which acquired Aldebaran from SoftBank Robotics in 2022 but has since shifted focus to distributing Chinese-made products. Founded in 2005, Aldebaran gained international recognition for Nao and especially Pepper, a child-sized robot used in retail and healthcare, but both saw limited long-term commercial success. Production of Pepper ceased in 2021, resulting in major layoffs, and the company’s latest project, the Plato robot, has not met expectations. Aldebaran’s future now hinges on whether it can secure fresh investment to avoid collapse and reposition itself in the robotics market. | Maddyness, Heise

🗞️ Schneider Electric announced a $700 million investment in the U.S. to expand its operations in AI and energy-related sectors. The French multinational plans to open two new manufacturing plants and upgrade existing facilities to meet growing demand for electrification, automation, and AI-driven energy management. This move will create hundreds of jobs and strengthen Schneider's presence in the U.S. market. The investment aligns with U.S. efforts to boost domestic manufacturing and clean energy infrastructure. It also reflects Schneider’s broader strategy to lead in sustainable and digital energy solutions globally. “We stand at an inflection point for the technology and industrial sectors in the US, driven by incredible AI growth and unprecedented energy demand," said Aamir Paul, president of North America operations for Schneider Electric, in a statement. "To lead the transformation ahead, we must be agile and act now to advance ambitious digitalization and efficiency goals to make an impact for generations to come." | Barron's

🗞️ Eurazeo is investing €100 million in Metrobloks to accelerate the development of next-generation data centers across Europe. This strategic partnership targets edge and modular data center infrastructure, catering to rising demand driven by AI, cloud computing, and digital transformation. Metrobloks, founded by seasoned data center entrepreneurs, will leverage Eurazeo’s backing to scale rapidly in underserved European markets. The move reflects Eurazeo’s broader ambition to support digital infrastructure and capitalize on the growing need for decentralized computing power. | Data Center Dynamics, Eurazeo

🗞️ France ranks third globally for AI-related carbon emissions, generating 159.17 kg of CO₂, largely driven by its high ChatGPT adoption, according to a new study by TRG Datacenters. With 2.3 million ChatGPT users and a per capita usage rate of 345—more than double that of Germany—France demonstrates some of the highest AI engagement levels in Europe. This intense usage highlights the country's deep integration of AI technologies into daily life. However, it also raises concerns about the environmental impact of widespread AI adoption, especially for a mid-sized country with such concentrated digital activity. | TRG Datacenters

🗞️ Former StudioCanal CEO Didier Lupfer has partnered with media executive Édouard Boccon-Gibod and tech entrepreneur Tariq Krim to launch a new Paris-based studio called The Media Company. The European film production studio aims to blend traditional storytelling with cutting-edge AI tools to develop innovative films, series, and digital formats. Their goal is to create high-quality, creator-driven projects that explore new narrative possibilities enabled by artificial intelligence. The company will also emphasize sustainability and ethical use of AI in the creative process. "We’ve built a studio that blends artistic ambition with technological innovation, delivering a full-stack solution for augmented creativity," Krim wrote on LinkedIn. "By integrating AI into every production stage, The Media Company introduces a new level of agility and efficiency. This enables the creation of original, universal stories while redefining the industry’s traditional workflows.This new venture is about inventing new possibilities — and knowing when to separate the tool from the artistic intent. We believe technology should support, not replace, artistic creation and creators. | LinkedIn, Variety, Cineuropa

ICYMI

🗞️ Descartes Underwriting: Doubling Down On Climate Risk As Insurance Industry Retreats | Chief Science Officer Kévin Dedieu: "AI represents between 2-5% of our tech investments. Next year, we’re increasing that by 10%, with more resources dedicated to AI and using it for our core models. The cost of AI is relatively low, but its impact is huge.” | The French Tech Journal

Europe Needs AI Infrastructure. Cleyrop Wants To Build It | Can Europe power its digital future without relying on non-European cloud providers? And if so, what kind of AI infrastructure does Europe need? These are the challenges that Arnaud Muller, co-founder of Cleyrop, has dedicated himself to solving. His company provides European public and private organizations with sovereign, AI-ready data storage and management solutions. | The French Tech Journal

🗞️ Growl's AI Boxing Bag Delivers A Knockout Fitness Experience | A pair of French entrepreneurs in Texas have launched Growl, a connected fitness startup that reimagines the traditional boxing bag as an AI-powered, interactive home coach. As the company moves towards commercialization, CEO and co-founder Léo Desrumaux explains the vision. | The French Tech Journal

🗞️ Digital Diplomats: AI is Making Silicon Valley Startups Leaner and Meaner. Can French Founders Keep Up? | U.S. Startups are reaching $100M ARR with less than 50 employees. French startups risk being squeezed if they don’t adapt. | The French Tech Journal

Interviews

🗣️ FlexAI: Pioneering Universal AI Compute Infrastructure

Compute infrastructure has emerged as a critical bottleneck in the rapidly evolving AI landscape. While innovation in AI models continues at breakneck speed, the hardware and infrastructure needed to train and run these models remain constrained, expensive, and complex.

A few years ago, over cappuccinos in Paris, tech industry veterans Brijesh Tripathi and Dali Kilani began a conversation about this dilemma that led to the founding of FlexAI in 2023. The company emerged from stealth mode in 2024 with $30 million in seed funding, establishing co-headquarters in Paris, Bangalore, and the United States.

Their observation was simple but fundamental: Modern AI workloads were being forced to run on computing architectures designed decades ago.

"At FlexAI, we are aiming to build the first universal AI compute infrastructure," Tripathi said.

AI Funding News

📇 Company: DeepIP
🔍 Description: A Franco-American AI startup revolutionizing the patent drafting process through an AI-powered platform designed to enhance, not replace, the work of intellectual property attorneys.
💻 Website: https://www.deepip.ai/
📍 HQ City: New York, USA & Paris, France
🧗 Round: Series A
💰 Amount Raised: $15 million
🏦 Investors: Resonance; Headline; Serena Capital; Balderton Capital
👨💼👩💼 Founders: François-Xavier Leduc; Edouard d'Archimbaud
🗞️ News: Business Insider

📇 Company: Opsima
🔍 Description: Developed a proprietary algorithm that optimizes the way companies buy resources from public cloud providers
💻 Website: https://opsima.ai/
📍 HQ City: Paris
🧗 Round: Seed
💰 Amount Raised: €1 million
🏦 Investors: Galion.exe, Kima Ventures, Source Ventures, Super Capital, Neo Founders
👨💼👩💼 Founders: Louis Raynaud, Alexandre Lacroux
🗞️ News: LinkedIn

Events

☀️ Sponsors' events ☀️

📆 Viva Technology | June 11 - 14 | VivaTech is Europe's biggest startup and tech event. The ninth edition is taking place in Paris, at the Expo Porte de Versailles venue. VivaTech contributes to the acceleration of innovation by connecting startups, technology leaders, large companies, and investors addressing the world's greatest challenges. | Buy Tickets

The calendar:

📆 Café du Numérique | April 4 | Discover how AI can revolutionize your business and boost your competitiveness. Connect directly with innovation experts. Get inspired by the success stories of companies pioneering the use of AI. | Registration

📆 AgentX | April 7 | AgentX is pioneering the first fully agent summit, designed to showcase the transformative power of AI and Decentralization. Co-created by two of the leading events in their domains, Paris Blockchain Week and RAISE, this revolutionary event will bring together the brightest minds, cutting-edge projects, and global visionaries to tackle the most pressing moments of the ongoing AI revolution: Agents and Decentralization. | Tickets

📆 AWS Summit Paris | April 9 |AWS Summit Paris 2025 is a free one-day event focused on generative AI, data, security, sustainability, and more. Customize your experience with a keynote featuring leading speakers, over 150 interactive sessions and workshops, one-on-one consultations with our experts, an exhibition area showcasing the latest cloud innovations, as well as numerous networking and training opportunities. | Register

📆 Data & AI Summit | April 10 | The Data & AI Summit 2025 will bring together IT decision-makers and AI experts to explore the opportunities and challenges associated with data and artificial intelligence. This event will highlight the impact of generative AI on business models, as well as best practices for maximizing the value of data within modern organizations. | Register

📆 Mistral AI Robotics Hackathon | April 11 - 13 | Join us on April 11th - 13th in Paris, to learn about and build on World Models & Embodied AI. For the first time ever, teams will have access to 40+ robotic arms from Hugging Face’s The Robot team, and build Real World Models powered by Mistral AI. ​There will be mentors and jury from lots of robotics companies, including: Hugging Face's LeRobot team, Mimic, Wandercraft, Phospho...and more. | Register

📆 MKIA 25 | April 29 | The Maddy Keynote, organized by Maddyness, announces its special edition: the MKIA, the event that transforms the broad guidelines on AI into concrete initiatives for the economic leaders of tomorrow. Far from abstract tech-symbol discourse, MKIA deciphers AI in a concrete and educational way through round tables, keynotes, case studies, and a zone for startups. It enables all actors – start-ups, corporations, investors, and institutions – to take ownership of the challenges, opportunities, and challenges of its adoption. | Register

📆 GOSIM AI Paris 2025 | May 6-7 | The Global Open-Source Innovation Meetup will spotlight the latest advancements in 6 Conference Tracks: AI Model, AI Infra, AI Apps, Embodied AI, AI for Science, and Global Open-Source AI Collaboration, driving significant progress in global open-source AI collaboration. A highlight of the event is the introduction of GOSIM AI Spotlight, a global initiative to select 10 outstanding open-source AI projects for showcase and technical exchange, further accelerating AI innovation. | Registration

📆 Google Cloud Summit France 2025 | May 22 | Join the annual Google Cloud event to discover the latest technological innovations in generative AI, security, application development, collaboration, and more. | Register

📆 The Paris AI Conference 2025 | June 16 | The Paris AI Conference 2025 gathers 250 of France's AI Experts, Founders, Investors, and Enthusiasts, for an evening of content and networking. This event is hosted by Startup Network Europe. | Register

📆 Stripe Tour Paris | June 17 | Join us for Stripe Tour, our global roadshow that brings together business leaders in major cities to discuss the most important trends in payments and financial technology. | Register

📆 RAISE Summit 2025 | July 8-9, 2025 | RAISE Summit is the premier event for professionals seeking to disrupt, build, and connect in the AI landscape. This summit is the ultimate destination to validate AI strategies through real-world use cases, define a winning AI playbook, and find the right partners to deliver cutting-edge solutions. | Register

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