Georges Karam holds out a bronze plate streaked with small squares.
“This is a 5G chip plate that we are making here to sell to our customers.
They then use them to design connected objects, ”says the founder and president of Sequans Communications proudly.
This Colombes-based company benefits from the State recovery plan, of which 34 billion euros are devoted to strengthening the competitiveness of companies and industrial sovereignty in the territory.
8.45 million euros will be paid to this French flagship of innovation in communications, which has been manufacturing chips since 2003. “Our know-how is unique in Europe,” says the founder.
Our main competitors are the Taiwanese group Mediatek and the American giant Qualcomm.
"
The creation of 15 to 20 jobs planned
“The State wished to support Sequans Communications in its development because it is a nugget on the scale of our department but also of the country.
It is a local source of pride because it is a leading company in its field ”, supports the prefect, Laurent Hottiaux.
“In general, our companies have sent many applications,” said the senior official.
The Hauts-de-Seine department will thus receive 18.6 million euros for the benefit of eight projects as part of the recovery plan.
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Sequans responded to the call for projects “Sovereignty in telecommunications networks, in order to accelerate 5G applications”, launched in autumn 2020 and under the Resilience fund.
State aid will enable it to finance the marketing of a new generation 5G chip within three years, with a higher speed than those that currently exist.
This project would allow the creation of 15 to 20 jobs in the region.
At the SNCF, more safety and connected trains
On this occasion, Sequans will lead a consortium of seven French companies, including SNCF, among the principals.
"It's a collaboration within the framework of a research and development project," explains Guillaume Vivier, Technical Director of Sequans.
SNCF will share its needs which will be taken into account in the development of digital solutions.
Thanks to our chips and artificial intelligence, they will be safer with connected trains, which will alert staff working on the tracks of any arrival of convoys.
This type of project helps strengthen the local fabric between large groups and SMEs.
"
However, this collaboration does not provide that SNCF necessarily purchases the finished products.
"These discussions will be set up independently, although we hope so," adds the director.
"Find your pet"
The development of a chip requires between eighteen months and three years, at a cost of 30,000 to 100,000 dollars
(Editor's note: between 25,000 and 85,000 euros)
.
“We have a team in London
(England)
and another in Israel because we could not hire in France.
Many qualified engineers go abroad ”, regrets Georges Karam.
This financial assistance from the State also aims to keep "French talents" on the national territory.
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Sequans' future 5G chips will be used in many areas such as the environment, safety and health.
With a confident gesture, Georges Karam begins to present various everyday objects: a scale, a watch and even a dog collar.
New technology can help 'know where the pet is'.
For the prefect Laurent Hottiaux (on the right), who visited the company, Sequans is a “nugget” and a “local pride”.
/ LP / MB-L.
These connected products are manufactured by Sequans customers, most of whom are American.
"The 4 and 5G networks are more developed in the United States", justifies the president.
“One of my clients is working on a medical patch,” he cites again as an example.
Thanks to this innovation, after an operation, the patient will be able to go home.
The patch, placed on the heart, will alert the hospital remotely in the event of a problem.
In surgery, we can imagine that robots will reproduce the doctor's actions.
To sum up, digital technology and 5G will make it possible to achieve a lot of things from a distance.
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