I’ve followed the path and recent announcements of several French startups for the past few weeks, including some from TheFamily. I’ll skip the blah blah part. I’d like to make a point that is clearly understated in France, and I’m going to keep it straight and short because you guys have better things to do:
The world won’t wait for you to get your subsidies, or fill-up your “Credit Impot Recherche” forms, neither will it wait until a corporation signs a first contract with you after 12 to 18 months of negotiations. Nobody gives a shit about the fact that it takes 6 to 9 months to raise a few hundred thousands euros in France. No, your product won’t fly miraculously across the borders to reach millions of people. And it’s not because it’s harder in France than elsewhere that you should make it an excuse. It’s actually easier to start in France: engineers are talented, pretty available and a lot less expensive than in the Silicon Valley. If you really strive to find a purpose, stop being so polished, become pirates, fight against the odds, treat every single day as a battle. Make a priority of the things that hold you down, don’t take anything for granted. “We have the best technology” is the new “we have a great idea” thing. In the end, it’s 99% execution. Build a team, make a product, go out and fuckin’ sell it.
Whatever the order! EXECUTE, BUILD, SELL, SCALE, BURN THAT CASH YOU’VE RAISED.
If you find yourself in this situation, get rid of it NOW. Close that page ☺
And btw, all of this does not prevent you from working hard while being nice and enjoying some quality time-off with friends and family.
Cheers fellows ☺