Draw inspiration from 10 remarkable US stories, written by Franck Delorme, president of Seed4soft

Drawing on his experience in the sector, Franck Delorme, president of Seed4soft, venture capitalist, entrepreneur and software expert, has put together a series of articles on the growth of French software publishers in the US.

Given the importance and the size of that market for software players, including for exits, expanding into the US is often a must: that is where the successes of our startups are made, and sometimes unmade. In that context, it is worth listening to the story and the experience (do's and don'ts, lessons learnt) of those who have done it, in order to help those thinking of going. Beyond the great successes of Business Objects, Criteo and more recently Talend, which have already been widely described, there are many other stories worth sharing. Franck Delorme has selected 10 of them, published in Maddyness: what difficulties did they meet? The do's and don'ts? The key lessons learnt? This summary sets out the main trends.

• A marked tendency for a founder-director to settle in the US (7 companies out of the 10 in the panel) and fairly early in the cycle: being on the ground gives a good feel for the market's dynamics and direct contact with the first customers and partners, who appreciate seeing the French startup's commitment on their territory. There is also better control of the American team and better sharing of DNA and culture (it avoids the cultural gap between the French and American teams). It is worth noting that Business Objects, Criteo and Talend also followed this path.
• Going to the US has a cost: travel, marketing, analysts, salaries (around 50% higher than in France), legal, local support. With the exception of Neotys, 6 of the 10 companies in the panel raised significant funds (between 20 and 75m€). Planisware and iValua relied on a self-funding model, which takes time and is not always possible depending on the market's dynamics and the intensity of competition. As for Streamroot, they are only at the beginning of their story and will probably raise significant funds in future.
• The importance of service quality, in the product as much as in local support (SLA): American customers are far more demanding and you do not get a second chance.
• It is not absolutely necessary to have a US VC, at least at first: across the panel, 10 out of 10 have French VCs and 4 out of 10 have American investors. Having one or more French VCs who know American business culture and do the same job is also a plus for settling any disagreements with the founder-directors and acting as a counterweight.
• Legally, it is interesting to note that 2 American VCs invested in a French legal structure (SAS), so the "flip", complex and expensive unless the US structure is created right at the start, is no longer an absolute must. Business Objects, Criteo and Talend all had their parent company in France.
• Location: half the companies in the panel have their US headquarters on the West Coast (Silicon Valley), but the East Coast allows a larger working window with the French teams, New York in particular, which has grown a great deal over the past 3 to 4 years with some fifteen accelerators, one of them French (Spark-labs) and many VCs on the ground (including Silicon Valley VCs with local offices). Operationally, it is key to cover American territory well as fast as possible, with sales and support teams as close as possible to customers and partners. More generally, we have seen in recent years a tendency to go and test the US market very early in a startup's life cycle, even before seeking to build significant sales in France and Europe first. These moves are made easier by the new opportunities that support structures and accelerators bring, such as: – US structures: Y Combinator (note that despite an extremely selective process, 5 French startups joined the programme by the end of February 2017), Techstars, US MAC and others. – Franco-American structures: the "Impact USA" programme from Business France, French Tech Hub, French Accelerator, The Refiners, Spark-labs, Orange Fab and others. Find the link to the full article below:
• U.S Stories by Franck Delorme – Feb 2017