> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # 🇫🇷 French Tech Wire: France Pulls Away From Big Tech — While French Tech Powers Up - URL: https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/french-tech-wire-france-big-tech-breakup-blacknut-revolut/ - Published: 2026-08-21T05:04:10.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-21T05:04:10.000Z - Description: France plots its escape from Microsoft, Apple cracks open the App Store, Blacknut lands up to $215M, Wandercraft takes exoskeletons home, and Revolut finally becomes a French bank. - Author: Chris O'Brien - Tags: Newsletter 👋 **Inside this week's edition:** 👀 **Essential Summer Reads #6:** The agency behind La Suite numérique is now ditching Windows for Linux on its own machines. And it's telling every ministry to map its way out of American software. [**Here's how the project works, and where it could still go sideways.**](https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/la-suite-life-inside-the-states-plan-to-swap-big-tech-for-open-source/) **Chris O'Brien + Helen O'Reilly-Durand** --- SPONSORED [![CTA Image](https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/content/images/2026/08/SOC_EMEA_Scaling-security_480x60-V2.png)](https://www.vanta.com/downloads/emea-customer-guide?utm%5Fmedium=newsletter&utm%5Fsource=french-tech-journal&utm%5Fcampaign=fy27q3%5Fnews%5Facq%5Ffrench-tech-journal-newsletter-series%5Femea) In today’s high-growth environment, security must be built-in—not a blocker. Our report, Scaling Security, shows how leading European tech companies embed compliance early and automate smartly to scale faster. Learn how automation transforms SOC 2, ISO 27001, and GDPR into strategic advantages. See what security maturity looks like at every growth stage. Security at scale is possible—with the right approach. [Download the Guide ](https://www.vanta.com/downloads/emea-customer-guide?utm%5Fmedium=newsletter&utm%5Fsource=french-tech-journal&utm%5Fcampaign=fy27q3%5Fnews%5Facq%5Ffrench-tech-journal-newsletter-series%5Femea) --- # Tech Talk 🧒 ⚖️ **Meta is on trial over whether it knowingly made kids the product -and France is having its own identity crisis over how to protect them.** Twenty-nine US states accuse Meta of misleading consumers and exposing children to harmful content and addictive features. A former safety exec says internal data showed **19% of 13–15-year-olds saw nudity in a single week**, while 12.8% encountered violence and 10.8% online harassment. Meta says it has beefed up safeguards. Meanwhile, France’s Constitutional Council has just killed off its planned under-15 social media ban, calling it disproportionate and flagging privacy concerns around age verification. Macron wants another go. The **platforms may be global, but the headache is universal.** |[**Le Monde**](https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2026/08/19/au-proces-de-meta-la-firme-de-mark-zuckerberg-accusee-d-avoir-cible-les-enfants-et-minore-les-dangers-d-instagram%5F6749391%5F3234.html?ref=frenchtechjournal.com), [**L’Étudiant** ](https://www.letudiant.fr/lycee/l-interdiction-des-reseaux-sociaux-aux-moins-de-15-ans-censuree-au-nom-de-la-liberte-d-expression.html?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) 🍎🚪 **Apple is finally opening the garden gate... at least a crack.** After three years of tussling with Brussels, the iPhone giant has agreed to let developers steer users outside the App Store from October, including to rival app stores and their own websites. **The catch? Apple is still charging fees of 5%–26%, after already being fined €500M for breaching the EU’s Digital Markets Act.** So yes, Europe got Apple to open the door...It just hasn’t convinced it to stop charging admission. | [**Le Monde**](https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2026/08/19/apple-consent-a-respecter-les-regles-europeennes-sur-les-marches-numeriques%5F6749357%5F3234.html?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) 🎮💸 French cloud gaming company Blacknut has secured **up to $215 million in backing from digital infrastructure investor Digital Alpha** to fuel its next phase of global expansion. The Paris-founded company, which now serves more than **3 million subscribers across 65+ countries**, plans to put the capital toward product development, content, infrastructure and international growth. Digital Alpha is becoming a **strategic shareholder**, although the companies did not disclose how much of the $215 million package is equity or provide further details on the transaction structure. Blacknut has built a catalog of more than 1,000 games and increasingly sells its platform through telcos, device makers and media companies. The deal is a sizeable bet that cloud gaming can become a major distribution channel and an increasingly important source of demand for GPU and edge infrastructure. | [**Blacknut**](https://www.blacknut.biz/press-release/million-dollar-investment-for-blacknut?ref=frenchtechjournal.com), [**Business Insider**](https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/digital-alpha-becomes-strategic-investor-in-blacknut-to-accelerate-the-global-growth-of-cloud-gaming-1036470341?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) 🤖🦿**French robotics startup Wandercraft is taking the exoskeleton out of the clinic and into the kitchen.** Its self-balancing **Eve** exoskeleton has won FDA clearance for eligible adults with spinal cord injuries at any level, allowing users to stand, walk and use their hands for everyday activities — from making coffee to reaching the top kitchen shelf. The device is designed to complement, not replace, a wheelchair, a**nd is set to launch commercially in the US on 17 September**. After 150+ rehab centers using its Atalante X, Wandercraft is betting the next frontier for exoskeletons is simply **getting on with life**. | [**Wandercraft**](https://www.wandercraft.eu/articles/wandercraft-receives-fda-clearance-for-eve-the-worlds-first-self-balancing-personal-exoskeleton-for-eligible-wheelchair-users-living-with-spinal-cord-injuries-at-any-level?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) 🏦 🇫🇷 **Revolut has officially leveled up from fintech to French bank.** The UK-based giant has secured a full French banking license after regulators pushed for closer oversight of its **7M French customers**. The move unlocks a bigger arsenal of loans, mortgages and savings products, as Revolut plans to invest **€1B and hire 600 people** in Western Europe, with Paris as its European HQ. Not bad for an app that started out helping people dodge foreign-exchange fees. |[**FT**](https://www.ft.com/content/1f5e2807-5110-47bc-baf1-757c7b675cb0?syn-25a6b1a6=1&ref=frenchtechjournal.com), [**Sifted**](https://sifted.eu/articles/revolut-french-banking-licence?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) 🚀 💶 **France wants to turn space spending into a boomerang.** Space trading platform Nebex has launched a **€100M initiative** promising €1 of industrial return to French space companies for every €1 France spends abroad - matching foreign procurement with contracts for French startups. The idea: governments still get access to the best global tech, while taxpayer money generates business at home. Nebex says French startups can tap into **$70B of annual cross-border space demand** currently lost to friction, regulation and geopolitics. **Forget more space VC: the startups need customers.** | [**Tech.eu**](https://tech.eu/2026/08/17/nebex-launches-eur100m-initiative-to-turn-global-space-spending-into-revenue-for-french-startups/?ref=frenchtechjournal.com) [Become a paid subscriber](#/portal/signup) --- # Essential Summer Reads #6: La Suite Life – Inside The State’s Plan To Swap Big Tech For Open Source ![](https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/content/images/2026/08/FTJ-esential-summer-reads.png) ***Throughout August, we’re revisiting eight long-form FTJ articles from the past year whose themes continue to resonate. From AI and deeptech to sovereignty, cybersecurity and global scale, they explore the ideas, companies and debates shaping French Tech. We hope you enjoy revisiting them with us.*** [***We published this article on La Suite Numérique in June.***](https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/la-suite-life-inside-the-states-plan-to-swap-big-tech-for-open-source/) --- For years, "digital sovereignty" was the speech French officials gave before renewing their Microsoft contracts. That era appears to be over. The **Direction interministérielle du numérique (DINUM),** the agency that steers the French state's digital strategy from the Prime Minister's office, is now running a two-front campaign to pull the administration off American software: [La Suite numérique](https://lasuite.numerique.gouv.fr/?ref=frenchtechjournal.com), a bundle of open source collaboration tools meant to replace Teams, Zoom, and Google Drive for public agents; and as of April, a plan to replace Windows with Linux, starting with DINUM's own computers. "The state can no longer simply observe its dependence; it must escape it," said David Amiel, France's minister for public action and accounts, when the plan was announced on April 8\. "We can no longer accept that our data, our infrastructure and our strategic decisions depend on solutions whose rules, prices, evolution and risks we do not control." That's the political framing. The more interesting story is what's happening underneath it: a small team inside DINUM quietly built a code-managed Linux workstation for its system administrators, liked it, and is now scaling the experiment into what could become the template for 2.5 million public agents. [Dig into La Suite Numérique here](https://www.frenchtechjournal.com/la-suite-life-inside-the-states-plan-to-swap-big-tech-for-open-source/) --- 👋🏻 If you’re enjoying [The French Tech Journal](https://frenchtechjournal.substack.com/?ref=frenchtechjournal.com), support the project by forwarding it to friends and sharing it on your social networks. You can also comment on this post. And if you have ideas for stories, tips, or just want to harass us, shoot us an email: [chris@frenchtechjournal.com](mailto:chris@frenchtechjournal.com) / [helen@frenchtechjournal.com](mailto:helen@frenchtechjournal.com) 👋🏻‌