An agreement protocol for exchanges between students of the Silicon Valley in California and the Telecom Valley of the French Riviera will be signed on March 5th in Sophia Antipolis.
Do the Silicon Valley and Telecom Valley have the same objective? Why not? Most certainly, the problem of the brain drain, mainly in the data processing sector is still in the current news. Besides, a senatorial mission came on February 22nd at the Foundation of Sophia Antipolis in order to meet company managers and researchers of the science park who were gathered by Pierre Laffitte.
However, all the collaboration programmes with the centre of NTIC are targeted. The association of the Telecom Valley has started a student exchange programme with the collaboration of the Foundation (see article 'Silicon Valley et Sophia vont échanger des étudiants'). With the intermediary of the French Consulate in San Fransisco, about fifteen placements were offered to students of Sophia Antipolis by American companies of the Silicon Valley (IBM San José, Cadence, Sprint, Bravo Brava et Pagoo).
The Telecom Valley transmitted those offers to the ESINSA, the ESSI, Eurécom, the DESS Télécom and the ISIA whereas the Foundation organized competitive examinations in order to select candidates. This exchange programme ( in the same way, students of the Silicon Valley will be integrated in high tech companies of the French Riviera) will be official on March 5th at 12.00 AM at the hôtel Mercure of Sophia Antipolis. An agreement protocol will then be signed between the Telecom and the Silicon Valley with the presence of representatives of the two bodies but also the French Consulate of San Fransisco, Stanford University, the Foundation of Sophia Antipolis, etc.
It might be a first step towards a larger co-operation between two centres of major technologic creation in the world, one in the United States and the other in Europe.