The executive has reason to rejoice. Despite an uncertain economic and geopolitical situation, the seventh edition of the “Choose France” summit, scheduled for this Monday in Versailles, opens under the best auspices. 56 projects have been announced by the Élysée for the event, twice as many as during the previous edition in 2023. The total amount of expected investments amounts to more than 15 billion euros, an absolute record since the launch of the summit by Emmanuel Macron in 2018. “It’s more than a glimmer of hope, it’s a great success,” welcomed the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire on the set of France 2 this Monday May 13 before reaffirming the objective of this summit: to allow France to “return to being a great industrial and productive nation.”
To achieve this, Bercy is banking on artificial intelligence and decarbonization, as shown in the list of investments unveiled this Monday.
Emmanuel Macron has never hidden his ambition to make France a European leader in artificial intelligence. AI players wishing to invest in France are therefore entitled to the red carpet this Monday. Investment announcements in this sector are expected to exceed six billion euros. The ambition is to provide France with data centers capable of providing unprecedented storage and computing power.
Microsoft will invest more than 4 billion euros in France, as Le Figaro revealed on Sunday. This massive investment, the largest of the summit, will be deployed by the end of 2027 and will be divided into three pillars: the construction of cutting-edge infrastructure, the training of French people and support for the national start-up ecosystem. The IT giant wants to expand the capacities of its two French data centers and build a third new generation site in the Mulhouse region. To celebrate this announcement, Emmanuel Macron will devote his first visit of the week to Brad Smith, Monday morning at the Microsoft France headquarters.
Amazon will spend 1.3 billion to build a data center for its cloud subsidiary AWS. The firm also wishes to set up a new warehouse for its e-commerce activities. In total, nearly 3,000 jobs should be created, including around a hundred for the data center alone.
Equinix will invest 630 million euros in a new data center. The American leader is a partner of the French company Alice
The Japanese telecom operator KKDI (Telehouse) will invest one billion euros for its “AI” activity. This sum will be allocated to the extension of existing sites located in Paris and Yvelines, as well as to the construction of two new data centers dedicated to AI, in Île-de-France and in the South region. These two sites will allow the creation of around fifty jobs each.
The consulting giant Accenture will open two research centers in generative AI, in Sophia Antiopolis and Paris. The creation of around a hundred jobs is planned. The amount of the planned investment has not been disclosed.
IBM is ready to invest 45 million euros in the creation of a research and development center in Saclay. The IT group plans to create around fifty jobs in this way. The boss of IBM, Arvind Krishna, is one of the dozen international leaders invited to Emmanuel Macron’s table on Monday.
The Finnish IQM plans to open a pilot quantum hardware laboratory. This site of the future could take place in Bordeaux. The amount of investment and expected jobs are not known.
More competitiveness, fewer polluting emissions. This could summarize the ambition of this edition of “Choose France”, which gives pride of place to decarbonization initiatives. At least eight projects should be formalized on Monday, for a cumulative amount of nearly 5 billion euros of investment, according to information revealed on Saturday by Le Figaro.
The Estonian start-up Skeleton Technologie plans to install an R center
The French Axens and the Chinese Hunan Changyuan Lico want to invest 600 million euros in a factory. The site of the two players will aim to manufacture cathodes, used in the composition of batteries and will hire 600 people. The location is not completely fixed, but Hauts-de-France holds the rope.
The KL1 company will build a nickel refining plant in Blanquefort (Nouvelle-Aquitaine). According to information from Le Figaro, it will invest 300 million euros on this site intended to supply active cathode materials manufacturing plants such as those of Axens and Lico from 2027. The project, eligible for the energy tax credit green, will lead to the creation of 200 jobs in this Gironde town shaken by the closure of the Ford factory in 2019.
The German start-up Lilium will invest 400 million euros to build an assembly plant for its electric plane and a battery reconditioning plant. It plans to hire 850 employees. The location of the site has not yet been decided, but New Aquitaine is mentioned. The project could benefit from the strategic projects guarantee for its financing.
The Franco-Belgian chemical giant Solvay will reconvert its La Rochelle factory in Seine-Maritime. This improved site will allow the launch of the “first phase of a large-scale rare earth production unit”, used in the construction of electric motors or wind turbines. Ultimately, this new “green” activity could represent investments exceeding 100 million euros.
Canadian Paper Excellence wants to devote 190 million euros to decarbonizing its French industrial sites. The pulp and paper player, established in France for several years, will equip its Saint-Gaudens (Haute-Garonne) site with a new production line at a cost of 150 million euros.
The Spanish start-up FertigHy will invest more than 1.3 billion euros in the Somme in favor of low-carbon agriculture. This investment aims to produce low-carbon hydrogen-based nitrogen fertilizers on the Languevoisin site. 250 jobs will be created to develop this innovative process which aims to avoid the emission of “nearly 1 million tonnes of CO2 per year”.
Also read: Decarbonization, a driver of foreign investment in France
Subscribers for years to “Choose France”, the global pharmacy giants have planned new promises as part of this seventh edition.
Pfizer will invest 500 million euros to strengthen the R ecosystem
AstraZeneca will devote 365 million euros to the decarbonization of all of its industrial sites. It will thus create around a hundred jobs. In 2020, the Swedish-British laboratory announced an investment of 450 million euros over five years across the country.
GSK will allocate 140 million euros to modernize its French production sites. The sites of Évreux (Eure), Saint-Amand-les-Eaux (North) and Mayenne are concerned.
Novartis will spend 28 million euros to improve its Huningue (Haut-Rhin) site and create 25 jobs. These positions will be dedicated to nuclear medicine research.
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No industry without funding. Bruno Le Maire once again pleaded for a union of capital markets on the France 2 set this Monday May. A theme that he will revisit in Brussels from Tuesday. In the meantime, he can rejoice in the enthusiasm of international banks for the French capital, as evidenced by the projects unveiled as part of “Choose France”.
The American investment bank Morgan Stanley will inaugurate its new European campus this Monday in Paris. The project, unveiled this Sunday by Le Figaro, aims to create a European hub for market activities and develop the group’s global financial research center. It will bring the number of employees of the American bank in the French capital to 500.
The main Emirati bank, First Abu Dhabi Bank, and the Nigerian bank Zenith Bank will open an office in Paris. The announcement, which will be made official on Monday, constitutes a good signal a few days before the start of the examination of the proposed law on financial attractiveness in the Senate.
The German Vorverk is committed to investing 72 million in the Châteaudun region. The company which produces Thermomix kitchen robots has been present in France since the 1960s. It had already announced 57 million investments in 2022. This new investment should enable the creation of around fifty jobs.
McCain is modernizing its factories for 350 million euros. The world leader in frozen potato products plans to improve its three sites in Harnes (Pas-de-Calais), Béthune (Pas-de-Calais) and Matougues (Marne) by 2028. involves modernizing existing production lines and creating new ones. Emmanuel Macron will visit the Matougues site during the day on Monday.
