Capgemini and École Polytechnique launch a “Blockchain and B2B Platforms” Chair

Paris, 4 April 2019 – Capgemini, École Polytechnique and the École Polytechnique Foundation are launching a new Chair position dedicated to the technological and economic implications of blockchain, to promote higher education and research in this emerging field. Jérôme Siméon, President of France Business Unit at Capgemini, and François Bouchet, Director-General of École Polytechnique, inaugurated this new Chair on 4 April on the École Polytechnique’s campus.

With a strong global expertise in new technologies, Capgemini, alongside École Polytechnique and its Foundation, is committed to the promotion of high-level teaching and research to train talent in the field of innovation, blockchain and business-to-business (B2B) platforms[1].

The “Blockchain and B2B Platforms” Chair aims to develop new skilled talent pools and to contribute to the emergence of professionals who are able to meet the challenges of blockchain and its integration in companies’ strategies. The Capgemini teams will work with the École Polytechnique students among others, on “innovation cluster days”. Gathering Group partners and clients alongside students, these sessions will lead them to think about blockchain and B2B platform use cases in an aim to meet the “business” needs of sectoral ecosystems selected for the occasion.

The purpose of this Chair is also to support academic research led within the Center for Research in Economics and Statistics (CREST, a CNRS, École Polytechnique and GENES joint research centre) and the École Polytechnique IT Laboratory (LIX, a CNRS and École Polytechnique joint research center) in the field of blockchain. It will be led by Julien Prat, CNRS researcher and Lecturer at École Polytechnique and Daniel Augot, Research Director at the Saclay INRIA centre.

It will give rise to the publication of co-signed research articles, in particular on the development of theory and best practice in the optimisation of blockchain use (in particular commercial use), in an aim to improve the application services provided by blockchains in both quantitative and qualitative terms. The Chair will provide both theoretical and operational insight to the scientific and industrial spheres in France and worldwide.

François Bouchet, Director-General of École Polytechnique, said, “This Chair, founded with Capgemini’s support, will enable us to offer our students high-level teaching based on research, that is directly connected with the needs of companies facing the problems and opportunities arising from blockchain”.

Jérôme Siméon, President of Capgemini’s France Business Unit and Member of the Group Executive Committee commented, “At Capgemini, we see blockchain as a breakthrough technology that will enable us to digitize and connect our clients’ business ecosystems, by securing and automating transactions and the exchange of information. Deployment of this technology at scale is especially complex, and requires the combination of technological expertise, in particular cloud, data management, platformization, automation and cybersecurity. We want to bring all of this to the Chair, to give it a strong technological dimension, and open it up to concrete applications”.

ABOUT ÉCOLE POLYTECHNIQUE

École Polytechnique is broadly international (36% of its students and 39% of its teaching staff) and combines research, teaching and innovation at the highest scientific and technological level. The education it provides promotes a culture of excellence with a strong scientific leaning and perpetuates a great humanist tradition.

Through the courses it offers – bachelor’s, engineering curriculum, master’s, graduate programmes, doctoral programme, doctorate, ongoing training – École Polytechnique trains decision-makers with a strong multidisciplinary culture, exposing them to both the research and business worlds. With its 22 laboratories, of which 21 are joint research centres with CNRS, l’X research centre works at the cutting edge of knowledge about the major interdisciplinary scientific, technological and societal challenges. École Polytechnique is a founding member of the Paris Institut Polytechnique.

www.polytechnique.edu

About Capgemini

A global leader in consulting, technology services and digital transformation, Capgemini is at the forefront of innovation to address the entire breadth of clients’ opportunities in the evolving world of cloud, digital and platforms. Building on its strong 50-year heritage and deep industry-specific expertise, Capgemini enables organizations to realize their business ambitions through an array of services from strategy to operations. Capgemini is driven by the conviction that the business value of technology comes from and through people. It is a multicultural company of over 200,000 team members in more than 40 countries. The Group reported 2018 global revenues of EUR 13.2 billion.

www.capgemini.com People matter, results count.

ABOUT THE ÉCOLE POLYTECHNIQUE FOUNDATION

Founded in 1987 by twenty major French companies at the initiative of Bernard Esambert (X 1954), who was then Chairman of the École Polytechnique Board of Directors, and with support from the École Polytechnique Alumni Association, the X Foundation brings together the university, its pupils and its research professors in the business world. Its main aims are to support the development of teaching at the École Polytechnique, to develop research and the transfer of advanced technologies to French industry, to finance the development of the X and to contribute to its French and international influence.

www.fondationx.org

[1] Business-to-business platforms are a new type of digital platform that brings companies into contact within a business ecosystem, to exchange information and value between partners.