Startup employment: deceptive stability in September 2024

September was a month of near-perfect stability for startup employment in France. Job creations offset job losses, with an almost zero balance.

But this stability masks major disparities in the ecosystem, and calls for caution between now and the end of the second half of 2024. We note that:

• a slow deterioration in growth that began in May and has now continued for 5 consecutive months;
• Traditionally, the summer months are always quieter, but give way to a resurgence in growth, however slight, at the start of the new school year. In 2024, for the first time, there was no upturn between August and September.

Record job creation/redundancy.

This stability in job creation in French Tech is just a façade.

In September, we noted that this was the record month of the year for job creation, but also for job losses in French startups.

In September, over 7,000 jobs were created but also eliminated. By way of comparison, since the beginning of the year, an average of more than 5,200 jobs have been created each month, and nearly 2,800 eliminated.

These sharp fluctuations can also be seen when analyzing the number of startups creating or cutting jobs. While the number of job creations and redundancies offset each other this month, startups laying off staff (2,756) outnumber those hiring (2,219). At the same time, the number of start-ups stabilizing their workforce has fallen by 20% in one month.

However, job-creating startups create more jobs on average (2.5) than job-cutting startups (2.1).

Strong regional and sectoral disparities.

With regard to our regional analysis, we note that the France of startups clearly shows “two different faces”. While the southern half of metropolitan France shows a positive balance, almost all regions to the north have lost jobs. This is particularly true of the Île-de-France region, which was hardest hit in September, even though it is usually the region that creates almost half of all French Tech jobs.

A sector-by-sector analysis demonstrates the disparity and diversity of France’s startup scene, beyond September’s apparent stability. While GreenTech continues to grow steadily, the other sectors show significant variations, far from the average stability we generally observe on our barometer.