Well, it's a great honor for me to moderate this discussion between two people I've known for a long time and whose careers I admire. Maurice, we'll start with you. You have an exceptional career that has become almost a legend in the industry. You remain as engaged and creative as ever. What still motivates you and what is your secret?
So, I don't think I have a secret. What motivates me is desire. It's the desire to do things and especially the taste for self-improvement. A long time ago, when I was asked to redefine the policy of advertising and positioning, I chose a phrase: self-improvement. And self-improvement is something that constantly drives me. I love challenges. It's my daily nourishment. If I don't have a challenge, I get bored, and since I'm not good at anything else, it's of no interest. That's as simple as that.
Great, Pascal. You took Criteo public a while ago, which is extremely rare for a French tech company, especially on the Nasdaq. You quickly followed with Kaiko and then Ledger. Many entrepreneurs would have chosen to take it easy. What drives you to keep wanting to build like that?
First, I'm very honored to speak next to Mr. Lévi. I want to be like him when I grow up, and I measure the path I still have to travel. To put things in context, I'll repeat what Maurice said: the desire to do things. I also have a sense of responsibility. When you are capable of doing things, you feel responsible. I felt responsible first towards my son because I didn't want to tell him that at 40 I stopped doing anything. I had to show him why it's important to do great things. Responsibility for me starts with family, friends, nation, Europe. If we don't do it, no one else will. That's what drives me. Also, working with people I like, like you. There's a quote from Yan Rogers: 'We'll work hard but also have a lot of fun.' A client once told me: 'We're in a tough phase, so I'll propose something: you'll earn much less, work much more, but at least you'll have fun.' I took it. We earned less, worked more, but had a great time.
Yeah, the word 'entrepreneur' is French. Americans often joke about it. Entrepreneurship means creating, and France has created a lot throughout its history. In your opinion, what is the challenge for the French entrepreneur today? What makes them specific? And what is their challenge today?
Well, it's true that Bush Jr. said there was no word for entrepreneur in France. The specificity of France is that it's a small country. In my sector, it's less than 2% of the global market. We don't even have 4% of global advertisers in France. Yet we have become the world leader. Perhaps because of constraints, the French entrepreneur is more imaginative, smarter, more creative, and finds solutions with fewer means than the American entrepreneur. When you look at an American entrepreneur's plan, it's about divisions, huge funding, and results to match. In France, it's about the 'system D' – figuring it out yourself in the face of French and European complexity. But at the same time, there's a desire for renewal and self-improvement that makes the French entrepreneur more ambitious and successful, proportionally. That's why there are many great French successes.
Yeah, the logic is that constraint forces creativity. It's like a painter who has to stay within his... Actually, in digital art, there are fewer constraints because it's an infinite space. But in advertising, you have to respect product, marketing, production, legislation, competition constraints. So many constraints, and from that you have to find the little idea that will germinate and become something great. So in this context of being a French company, many French tech unicorns start locally and then internationalize gradually. In the two companies you led, you had a global vision from the start. What is the secret to creating a global company from France?
Well, it's first about ambition and global thinking from the start. I was never interested in... My training was with Pierre Chappaz at Kelkoo, then at Yahoo. I always worked in global companies, so I got used to it. I like working in different countries, meeting different cultures. That's what motivates me in business. My ambition was always to recreate what I had seen and create global companies. I'm competitive in business. For me, business is a mix of sport and war. I like business conquest. In technology, it's a global game or nothing. Local players have a short life unless bought by global ones. I always wanted to build world-class companies. With Jean-Baptiste Rudelle, we agreed on ambition. Everyone told us not to go to the US, we'd get crushed. We didn't listen, and the US became Criteo's biggest market. Then for Bitcoin, it was naturally global. Ledger ships products worldwide: 2% revenue in France, 98% international. That's similar to what you said about advertising. The global aspect of Bitcoin attracted me to Ledger. It starts with ambition, then execution. It's like a bike: once you've done it, it's easier. Ledger is the global category leader, well-positioned for the future. We are a consumer-first company. There aren't many B2C companies that found a global market from Europe – maybe Skype, Spotify. So it's exciting.
If I may, I'd like to build on what Pascal just said. Two things are very important. First, digital changes the game. In digital, the market is global from the start. We need entrepreneurs like him who think globally from the outset, not just the Paris region or France. Second, one of my mentors wrote a great book: 'There is no room for small dreams' – Shimon Peres. He always said you have to think big because big or small, it's the same effort. I think it's good to think big.
