Weatherforce

An example of successful support

Founded in 2016, Weatherforce is a start-up specialized in providing very local weather indicators.

It has benefited from a series of monitoring, funding and support measures from CNES, Connect by CNES and other partners, which have enabled the fledgling company to become well-established and consolidate its corporate vision. Today, WeatherForce is building on this framework to grow its business and break into international markets.

Co-fondatrice de Weatherforce — Christine David, co-founder of Weatherforce

We transform "raw" weather data into useful indicators for our clients. For example, two farmers will be faced with problems (slugs, moths, mildew, etc.) that differ greatly depending on their crops.

The weather is a determining factor in pest development and in the selection of crops adapted to each region, so it is really important to provide professionals with highly localised indicators (rainfall, sunshine, temperatures, etc.) tailored to their own situation.

These data are not always available or easily accessible abroad, which made us aware of the significant business potential.

With this in mind, Pascal and Christine decided to create WeatherForce in 2016, to provide weather and climate services in remote areas and offer indicators reflecting the reality of each kind of local weather, relevant to each particular crop.

Three types of assistance

WeatherForce has been able to benefit from three schemes offered by players in the space sector, designed to support start-ups in their creation and development.

Incubation

First of all, the young start-up was nurtured by the European Space Agency's incubation programme, ESA BIC. This scheme allows project leaders in the space field to benefit from specific support over a two-year period including access to subsidies (up to €50,000), a bank loan (up to €50,000), accommodation in fully-equipped premises and 80 hours of technical support from CNES experts.

Among other things, this incubation programme gave us access to CNES experts, an opportunity not open to everyone. Their help has been invaluable in building and validating our service offer and the technical feasibility of our projects.

SUPPORT

At the same time, WeatherForce benefited from the CNES Business Applications scheme. This programme seeks to encourage the implementation of space-related projects right across the board by facilitating the different stages: emergence of ideas, funding, support, etc.

We worked a lot with Jacques through Business Applications; his help was particularly formative and key for us.

Financement

Lastly, the young company received support via the Space Ticket, a recent scheme set up by CNES and its partners. The Space Ticket is a kind of free pass that makes it easier for the selected start-up to obtain BPI financing under the French Tech Seed Fund and gives access to the Connect by CNES support scheme.