Invest in France Agency north-america Office

Francois Silvain, CEO of StoreXperience

 

Why France?

StoreXperience’s ability to conduct business in the US and Europe from the start is perceived as a critical competitive advantage.

StoreXperience is a US company with European DNA. Through the Young Entrepreneurs Initiative, our company was able to identify and engage with technology firms and R&D centers in France with expertise that can further accelerate our product development. In addition, from a business development standpoint, the introductions made by the Young Entrepreneurs Initiative in various “centres de competences” proved to be extremely valuable and should translate into short-term business opportunities. We would not have been able to move so quickly without this active support.

From an R&D perspective, building an enterprise class solution that leverages the mobile device of the consumer to deliver contextual information based on a rich shopping context, requires world-class technology and a qualified technical team to manage it.

StoreXperience sources mobile technologies from Europe and combines them with SAAS expertise from the US to build a truly innovative yet reliable business solution in Europe, where mobile technology is more advanced. This creates an opportunity to set up valuable partnerships with European companies like Mobile Distillery, Netsize, or Imagination GmbH. The engineering education in France develops adaptable, flexible and creative people. These qualities are fundamental in early stage company where you need to constantly tune the product development to the market needs and, ultimately, customer needs.

Presence in Silicon Valley gives access to a vast pool of resources, talent and potential partners. Management experience demonstrates that developing successful technical partnerships requires not only presence – but also cultural compatibility.

From a business perspective, Europe offers a mature mobile market combined with an innovative retail sector. This makes the European retail market a very attractive business opportunity for StoreXperience, and a good indicator of long-term success. Some of the recent achievements in the European retail market include:

- Selection of StoreXperience by INRIA and Lille Euratechnologies, two respected organizations in the field of research and innovation, for its expected impact on the distribution and the retail sectors;

- A strategic partnership with PICOM (a test site for new retail technologies sponsored by 40 top European retailers, 13 research institutes and academic institutions, and 12 government agencies).

Conversely, the US is a more mature market when it comes to on-demand software services.

Why Young Entrepreneurs Initiative and Invest in France?

We got in touch with the YEI program through Francois Laugier, a partner at RMKB (a law firm in Silicon Valley), and member of the French Trade Advisory network.

The YEI helped StoreXperience with our start-up strategy/implementation phase in France. With the support of Invest in France, we defined an RFP which we addressed to specific competitive clusters and regions in France. After an initial selection, YEI and Invest in France organized a visit to France to meet the key representatives and decision makers in 3 clusters that had been short-listed (Marseille, Paris and Lille). In less than 4 weeks, we had a chance to review 5 proposals, meet with representatives from the regions and 3 clusters, and identify Lille and the Industry of Commerce Cluster as a perfect opportunity. This was huge help for StoreXperience - we saved a lot of time and energy by relying on YEI and Invest in France.

Once we had chosen Lille, the Lille Metropole Development Agency took the lead and helped us connect with the local eco-system. Thanks to LMDA, we were selected by the Incubator Euratechnology and created StoreXperience Europe on March 30th in the Euratechnologies facilities.

What is your project in France?

 StoreXperience is targeting 3 objectives in France:

1) Develop research and development by leveraging French competency and productivity. We are expecting to hire 21 employees by the end of 2010.

2) Establish strategic partnerships with industry clusters in Lille and build a key competitive advantage.
PICOM was founded in Lille, France, in July 2005 as an international competitive cluster for the retail industry. It is a coordinated effort by leading retailers, research centers, universities, and government agencies.
With over 100 million consumers within 200 miles from the city of Lille, the Metropolitan Statistical Area of Lille offers a unique testing group for new retail models and technologies. Close to 40 retailers with international reach are headquartered in this area or run their procurement and logistics centers from this region.

In Lille we are now a key player within  LMU (Lille Metropole Ubiquitaire), a large-scale initiative sponsored by the PICOM. Its objective is to define the role that mobile devices can play in retail. LMU selected Parc V2, one of the largest shopping centers in Europe with close to 160 stores, as its live test center for new technologies and business models. The project plan calls for initial deployment of advanced mobile technologies in the second semester of 2008.

3) Develop sales and marketing activity in France and in Europe
While Wal-Mart is the undisputed World leader, the second largest retailer is Carrefour, a French company headquartered in Paris. Both the US and European markets represent attractive opportunities for StoreXperience and are within reach. In fact, over 25% of StoreXperience’s existing leads are based in France alone. If the French retail market is smaller in size, the higher penetration of advanced mobile devices, combined with a more mature retail market clearly open to new technologies make it a very interesting opportunity.

What are your next steps?

StoreXperience is raising $5M through a series A. The company is looking for a lead investor who acknowledges the potential of mobile phones in the retail sector, can contribute relevant knowledge and expertise, and wants to build a long-lasting and mutually rewarding relationship with this team.

 

About StoreXperience

StoreXperience is an enterprise software solution that targets the retail sector. StoreXperience provides mobile shopping applications and creates interactivity in the store between consumers, stores and brands.

 

Herve Pluche brings over eighteen years of professional experience in the US and Europe in various industries including telecommunications, enterprise software, electronics, and aerospace. Herve started his career in R&D at MIT, transitioned into management consulting and venture capital before pursuing an entrepreneurial career in Silicon Valley. Herve launched Neocase Software, a leader in CRM applications, in the US. In the span of his career, Herve worked for Archimedes Technology Group,Avanti Partners, Telecom Italia; Bain & Company; Thomson-CSF; Construcciones Aeronauticas S.A. and conducted research at MIT. Herve is a graduate of the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the French National College of Aeronautical Engineering.

With 20 years of experience in the software industry and the start-up environment, Francois Silvain  brings to StoreXperience strong leadership and deep domain expertise in CRM. Over the past 7 years, Francois launched and managed Sevina Technologies and Neocase Software, two successful start-ups in the area of customer service.. Francois started his career as a software engineer in the telecom industry, later became CTO of Spartacom before selling the technology to Microsoft. Francois is a graduate of the National Computer Science and Management Institute in Paris.

www.storeXperience.com