How do you define cyber sovereignty in a globalized ecosystem?
Sovereignty is not autarky: it is not about cutting oneself off from the world, but about having the power to choose. Being sovereign means choosing one's technological dependencies, partners, and standards; mastering critical components and being able to act without being subjected to external pressure. We will never produce everything ourselves. On the other hand, it is essential to identify what is strategic and maintain control over it. Cybersecurity has become a matter of economic power: when an organization controls neither its tools, nor its data, nor its infrastructure, it becomes vulnerable. Technological sovereignty therefore relies on a balance between international openness and strategic lucidity. As for the response, it must be European, because threats know no borders.
The French cyber sector is innovating but struggling to produce global leaders. Where is the bottleneck?
The bottleneck is not innovation, as we have the entrepreneurs, the talent, and academic excellence. The real challenge lies in scaling up: our startups find seed funding, but access to the mass market remains complex, and major accounts still rely heavily on well-established international players.
To foster champions, three levers are essential: we need more structured private and public procurement, concrete European coordination, and the ability to support market consolidation. The goal is not to buy French as a matter of principle, but to build European solutions capable of winning through their performance.
"The massification of risk requires the massification of the response" - Farida POULAIN
NIS 2 will scale up cyber obligations. Are we collectively ready?
NIS 2 is changing our scale: from a few hundred strategic players, we are moving to tens of thousands of concerned organizations. The risk would be to perceive this directive as just another regulatory constraint, whereas it represents an opportunity to structure the entire sector. Indeed, the massification of risk requires the massification of the response: diagnostics, solutions, pooling of resources, training... This is the core of the work undertaken at Campus Cyber under the leadership of its president Joffrey Célestin-Urbain: mapping existing solutions and eventually structuring a true marketplace to support organizations subject to NIS 2. Cybersecurity has truly become a governance issue. If NIS 2 shifts us from a reactive logic to one of anticipation, it can become a powerful lever for performance and collective resilience.
About Farida Poulain
Farida Poulain has been the Managing Director of Campus Cyber since November 2025. She was previously the Program Director of Cyber Booster, following a twenty-year career in finance and tech as an analyst, entrepreneur, M&A advisor, and investor.
