While I think that supporting startups is a good idea, creating a campus without a nearby network of rich investors is like sowing seeds in sand. I've been part of more than one startup in Europe and it is far more difficult to secure early-stage investment than in SF. Until Europe has an equivalent VC presence, SF will always have the edge. I hope that this campus will attract that sort of attention from investors but we have a long way to go.
There are plenty of SF startups (and full-sized companies like Twitter etc.) that never make a profit. But startups in SF that can make a profit will still win out over European equivalents since they're granted such huge runways to perfect their product before they're under pressure to go to market.
I agree that the incentive system for startups right now is broken, as so many are simply aiming for an IPO before they're exposed as jokes but there's an inherent advantage to being in SF for any type of fledgling tech business.
"perfect their product before they're under pressure to go to market."
This maybe the wrong way to think about it. Outside of hard-tech I see very few companies that are benefitted by building in a void.
Though your larger point still stands, once you have product market fit, the funding regime in SF gives an unfair advantage to companies that know how to use it for their particular domains.
Restricting access to funding will exclude companies that are capital intensive. This means that rather than incubate, say, a company seeking to build technology related to the "smart" electrical grid (time-horizon ten years minimum) we'd see incubation of things like greeting card companies. (Mature market, very little risk.)
This and also if that campus is active promoting itself (meetups, hackatons, events, accelerators…), the VC's will come over themselves – they need the talent. Europe is small and geographically that's really not a problem.
In Paris, you can get good senior developers for $100-150k, all inclusive. This includes job loss protection, health care, and the founders can keep their jobless allocation for the first couple of years of starting their company.
Also the investment tissue has considerably developped, the funding stages become a pain mostly at series C.
Honestly, I would be surprised if there is no VC development.
I'm an American senior developer who also happens to be fluent in French. I would kill to work in Paris, but every time I have looked the rates for senior engineers were 1/3 what you're describing and there's no way I'm moving for that.
I believe he meant 150k as the whole cost to the company for a decent engineer while in the end it's split like 80k of taxes and 70k of salary.
The cost of living is a bit lower than in an expensive US city and of course you contribute directly to the social security system and much more. Hidden in all those taxes are the free healthcare, free education (including universities), up to two years of reduced salary if you lose your job, pension and much more...
While the number on the paper looks much lower, in reality your standard of living isn't much different.
1) You get your [not really] free education in France not in Paris because it's crazy expensive [unless you live there with your family who own something].
2) Get your master [you can only do master level here and everything else is highly underated].
3) You try to leave to America and you can't because H1B are crazy impossible to get.
4) You move to London.
5) You realize your master is useless there and you could have got all the same with only a bachelor, save the money and a few years of your life.
6) You go back to France once a year for the engineer school job fairs to recruit interns and help Frenchies leave their country.
150k is the fully loaded all inclusive cost (and in France, that a lot of inclusive) to the employer, so 50k being the salary part is consistent with that.
For senior developers in Paris the median may be around 50-60, (most of software engineer jobs are in consultancies) but there are tech companies that pay up to twice as much . I know mine does, and is looking for developers from all around the world, if you're interested :)
Got me. That being said there's been quite a lot of funding happening in Paris lately, and there are a few French companies (some of them startups) which are starting to match Criteo's compensations.
Murex, eFront, Theodo, Smart AdServer, SAP, Streamroot, Klee Group …
Basically all the companies I know someone in pays this kind of salary to people with 3 to 5 years of experience !
Are we really living in the same city ?
Right. Now you hopefully see the difference between what they would like to pay and what they will have pay [to bring back top French talent from abroad] ;)
