The startup scene in France

Cannes has a documented cultural and creative industries focus at Université Côte d’Azur’s Georges Méliès campus. The city reported in May 2026 that the Cannes On Air consortium brings together 102 cultural and creative industry actors. (Claims 110434, 110436)

Bastide Rouge, created in 2014, is an enterprise nursery developed by Cannes Pays de Lérins with its five member municipalities. Its published eligibility covers creative industries, space, senior economy, agritech, nautical activities, and events/business tourism, and requires companies to be registered for less than 12 years or new projects to register within three months. Its contact-based application route convenes a selection committee when private space becomes available; current vacancies were not verified as of October 4, 2026. (Claims 110410, 110411, 110412, 110413, 110441)

Examples of local creative and technology activity include Adastra, whose official history identifies Cannes as its founding location in 2008 and names Sébastien Aubert and David Guiraud as founders; its filmography says it produced LaRoy, which received the Deauville Grand Prix. Objeos originated in Sophia Antipolis in 2015 and is now placed by its official site in Cannes’ Image and Creative Industries technopole, where it specializes in spherical 360-degree displays. Bastide Rouge’s directory lists e.Nova Aerospace as hosted at its nursery and dates its founding to 2019; e.Nova describes its BFS project as a means of safely returning scientific experiments from orbit. (Claims 110415, 110416, 110417, 110418, 110419, 110420, 110421, 110422, 110424, 110425, 110426)

Other documented examples include Osol, identified by Manutan in May 2025 as Cannes-based and providing portable workspace energy; Manutan reports that Osol received mentoring, networking, and logistics support through its Moov’with Manutan program. Bastide Rouge’s directory lists Hive as a hosted company, while SC Ventures’ March 20, 2024 announcement reported leading a EUR 12 million Series A for Hive, a distributed cloud provider. The city reported that Cannes Lérins hosted ActInSpace at Georges Méliès on January 30–31, 2026, with Telecom Valley support. (Claims 110427, 110428, 110429, 110430, 110431, 110432, 110439)