Celebrating 3 Years of Le Camping: track-record

Let's go back in time. To January 2011. 

Le Camping, the first startup accelerator, was inaugurated within the walls of the Palais Brongniart, just one metro stop away from NUMA.

It was, at that time the first and only structure of its type in France: not an incubator but an accelerator. Boom, it was that explosive!

“Accelerating” means gaining speed and points toward the fact that it's possible to do so at unthinkable speeds. Accelerating also points to an ambitious process of endlessly improving on your previous feats.

In the space of three years, we have not only helped to develop seriously good startups, we've also spread some essential values as well as an action model that has spread like wildfire throughout the ecosystem.

First & foremost, what exactly are our values?

Sharing, friendship, emulation. We know that setting up a company only makes sense if we do it together. You don't innovate alone in your basement (no longer). Our main mission then is to create spaces (as the models & formats of events) that foster this “do-it-together” attitude.

Determination, open-mindedness, but also goodwill.

Though being an entrepreneur involves being opportunistic and seizing upon things within your own environment, this also needs to be done dynamically and openly, not closed up without a thought for the outside world.

It means adhering to the logic of a network in a genuine and generous way (again, not false generosity, expecting something in return immediately, but free generosity, something which is much more powerful, and much more rare).

As Mozart said, “Real genius without a heart simply cannot exist”!

Being an entrepreneur means sowing seeds then, perhaps one day, harvesting. It involves patience, tenacity, listening to others and, at the same time, always being true to yourself and your vision.

It means going forward confidently and coherently towards your destiny without forcing it, (the “Amor Fati” of which Nietzche wrote). It means getting help. It means knowing how to surround yourself with the right people.

Secondly, who are our startups?

In just 3 years, we have accelerated the development of 60 startups, of which 90% are still alive and kicking today.

Wonderful startups have come about:

*** Sketchfab, a 3D web platform, now with their very own button on Photoshop

*** Lima, connected object which enables users to synchronize all their documents, sold on Kickstarter for 18 times their initial fund figure (1,229,074$)

*** Doctrackr, in the online security sector, having subsequently gone through Techstars and have raised 2 million dollars

*** Bankin', an application enabling users to manage their finances via their smartphones, with nigh on one million users now.

3 years of Le Camping has also seen significant increases in turnover, jobs created on a daily basis and 10 million euros in raised funds, with amounts raised increasing exponentially as we go further up this accelerating path.

But this is just the beginning. The funny thing at Le Camping is that we focus both on the short-term acceleration and the long-term success of our Campers.

We are willing to bet on the fact that, among our alumni of 60 startups, lies a future Criteo. Few are the chosen ones, but we are sure they're here. Having seen all of our startups here hard at work over the years, we are entirely persuaded of this fact.

Accelerating startups: a model that has spread like wildfire

When Le Camping was launched, we were at the beginning of a wave. Today accelerators are being launched every other day, proof that Silicon Sentier, soon to be known simply as NUMA, knew what they were doing.

Entrepreneurial values have spread at the speed of light, the digital revolution makes us, by its very nature, more independent.

It offers us the means to create content, share and communicate thanks to large-scale distribution lines. We are becoming, all of us, real players in this world.

The numbers are there, showing us that the market is ripe. Criteo is a fantastic success story in France and can function as a model.

Many dream of launching their own startup. Venture capitalists are back in town, but this time there's not the same excess as in the early 2000s.

The internet has truly conquered the world. More and more frequently are companies being floated on the stock exchange. The digital economy is generating revenue for many different shareholders and though we mustn't get too carried away, bubbles are an ever-present danger, we are still seeing positive signs such as the increasing number of users – over a billion new internet users between 2008 and 2012.

The good news is that France has everything in place to be the next startup nation: talent, creativity, workspaces, depth, awareness of its weaknesses, willingness to act.

As you've no doubt come to understand, Le Camping is but a brick in a highly ambitious wall, NUMA's highly ambitious wall. Stay tuned.

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Thanks to our partners, without them, nothing of that would be possible !