ParisIsBack – The Paris Tech Guide

ooo - I've one for Dublin, Ireland.

http://www.slideshare.net/FrontlineVC/the-irish-tech-startup...

Kudos to people who will post the tech guides for other European cities like Berlin and London as I don't have them.

the real pain is the housing and the subsequent suburb transportation.

from Paris with love <3

If you compare with other major capitals, like SF, NYC or London, housing is quite cheap (around twice as less expensive). And although the transportation system is far from being flawless, it's not worse than any other one.

There are a bunch of nice things to be said about Paris and the tax rebate system they put in place for startups and companies that spend heavily in R&D. However I think that Paris has a very low quality of life in most of the fields that are ignored in metrics:

- Apartment prices are usually measure by the room when doing comparisons. In Paris the room count is misleading: I've seen studios smaller than 15 m^2 and 1BR smaller than 25 m^2.

- Apartment quality is really really bad: creaky, cracked hardwood floors that haven't been replaced since Haussmann, humidity and mold are the default.

- The weather is awful, it rains 40% of the days.

- This might sound surprising but the average food quality is abysmal: produce is expensive and tastes like nothing and the random brasserie is an expensive tourist trap.

- Some of the stereotypes about the Parisian being grumpy and pretending not to speak English have a grain of truth. [edit: this is going to get me downvoted to hell]

So if you are really planning to start a business in France, go to another city: e.g. Lille is a thriving city with a very rich cultural life, it's 1h away from Paris by train (if you need to network you can commute) and doesn't suffer from most of the above (except for the climate).