Four startups retailers should consider from Vivatech 2021

What:  Our visit and review of one of the most important Tech fairs in Europe

Why it is important:  4 interesting start-ups that we spotted for our members, with some potential for immediate retail applications. 

Viva Technology (aka Vivatech) is a French fair dedicated to new technology, launched in 2016, and seen as the French response to the tech hype from California and the CES in Las Vegas. With the permanent support of the French President, Emmanuel Macron, who promotes the “start-up nation”, this tech fair became in 4 editions a rendezvous of choice, where all tech moguls from the world gave speeches (Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Ma, Satya Nadella from Microsoft), but also world leaders such as Justin Trudeau or John Kerry, and world figures (Usain Bolt, Bernard Arnault).

The 2021 edition was, due to the Covid-19 context, unique as it was one of the first mass-scale events to be held in Europe, organized in a hybrid way, with both a physical fair with live events, echoed by an online platform to maximize visibility. In terms of numbers, this meant 26,000 physical visitors and 114,000 users on the platform (to give a sense of comparison, the first edition welcomed in 2016 45,000 visitors, and the last pre-pandemic one in 2019 attracted 124,000 people).

We decided to attend this edition as we believe the IADS should help its members detect innovative approaches and solutions wherever they are, in complement to their own efforts. Also, it was a way for us to catch a glimpse of where “retail tech” stands. 

IADS provides its members with a weekly in-depth analysis on retail-oriented topics. This is an example of the themes the Association regularly addresses, and the topic of an article from the IADS members-only newsletter date 30 June 2021.