Thanks to the mobilization of its laboratories and the responsiveness of its subsidiary AMVALOR, Arts et Métiers been able to meet the requirements of the R&D job preservation scheme set out in the France Relance plan.
Launched to boost the resilience of the national economy in the face of the health crisis, the France Relance Plan also had a strong vision for the future: to build the France of 2030, a project that requires the mobilization of research and engineering skills.
With this objective in mind, an initial budget of €300 million was allocated to a powerful mechanism for preserving R&D jobs. In concrete terms, the state covers up to 80% of the salaries of personnel involved in research contracts between a public laboratory and a company. The contracts are aimed at both engineers on permanent contracts within companies and young graduates.
Arts et Métiers the rendezvous
Administrative complexity, the multitude of post-COVID measures offered to businesses, shorter application deadlines, the acceleration of economic recovery, tensions in the industrial job market... All these factors contributed to the fact that the measure, initially calibrated by the public authorities for 2,000 beneficiaries, ultimately benefited only 1,400 people in France.
"It's a mixed picture, but Arts et Métiers out for its effectiveness," says Stéphane Desmaison, director of AMVALOR. Given the societal and economic challenges of such a project, the Arts et Métiers group Arts et Métiers the Ministry of Higher Education and Research in December 2020, and it was only natural that our subsidiary should be responsible for coordinating this initiative."
The director of the "economic arm" of the Arts et Métiers group Arts et Métiers : "The program was complex, and we had to be very responsive and agile enough to put together the applications while meeting the deadlines and constraints imposed by the public authorities. It is in our DNA to be close to businesses, to understand their needs and adapt to them, while satisfying regulatory constraints with great rigor and efficiency."
65% of SMEs and mid-cap companies
For Bertrand Coulon, Director of Development at AMVALOR, it was essential that this opportunity be promoted to SMEs: " Every day, our clients call on us to remove the technological barriers to their projects, but we are also used to removing the administrative and regulatory barriers that sometimes hinder SMEs' access to public aid and financing schemes.
In the end, SMEs and mid-cap companies account for 65% of the contracts set up by AMVALOR, with SMEs alone accounting for 50%. The detailed figures (see below) show very balanced results in terms of the distribution of audiences, territories, and types of companies.
Mobilization of laboratories
"It is thanks to the strong mobilization of our laboratories throughout the country that we were able to achieve this feat," insists Stéphane Desmaison. However, the challenge was considerable: "It is no small feat to welcome 43 additional FTEs in just a few months. We had to integrate them into the teams while adapting to the constraints and operating methods of each partner company.Our greatest success is the smooth integration of these new employees, both within our laboratories and our partner companies. At Saint Gobain, for example, the young AMVALOR employees are even included in the official organizational chart."
Stronger ties between public research and industry
For Bertrand Coulon, this assistance will contribute, well beyond its term, to strengthening relations between public research and industry: " For our teacher-researchers, research engineers, and doctoral students, going into business is nothing new. On the other hand, the integration of our clients' salaried engineers into our laboratories is a real added value of this program. Working together, in the same space, within the same teams and on the same project can only strengthen the relationship between public research and industry in the long term."
In figures
- 43 jobs, 53% of which are in regional areas
- 23 young graduates hired
- 40 partner companies, 65% of which are SMEs and mid-cap companies
- 10 Arts et Métiers laboratories Arts et Métiers
- €7.6 million in revenue for AMVALOR at the end of the program
- €4 million in subsidies for partner companies
