What makes Roxanne Varza a Global Shaker?
Roxanne Varza is a director at Xavier Neil’s Station F, the biggest start-up campus in the world. The immense business incubator is located in a former rail freight depot designed by Eugène Freyssinet and was previously known as la Halle Freyssinet — this is where the facility’s name originated. The old rail yard plays host to over 1,000 start-ups and provides classes in coding and useful resources for early-stage companies. It claims to be “the only start-up campus gathering a whole entrepreneurial ecosystem under one roof” and was started with an investment of $57 million by Xavier Neil.
As of 2019, the company states that it currently hosts 101 entrepreneurs from 21 countries, has already been involved in 32 acquisitions, built five unicorns, undertaken three IPOs, employs 25,000 people worldwide and has raised $5 billion in combined funding. The facility is huge at 34,000 square meters and holds over 3,000 desks with 24/7 access for users. They are currently working on a co-living space that will have the capacity to house 600 entrepreneurs. Facebook, HEC Paris and Amazon Web Services amongst others are currently operating on the campus.
Varza herself was born in Palo Alto, California to Iranian parents who immigrated in 1979 during the revolution. The young techspert obtained a bachelors in French literature from UCLA and graduated in 2006 and then joined Business France. Consequently, she decided to undertake further education in France and completed a dual degree from Sciences Po Paris and the London School of Economics and completed a masters degree in international business and a degree in international economic policy respectively.
She was the editor of TechCrunch France from 2010 to 2011, before becoming the head of Microsoft’s French start-up activities which included Bizspark (which was shut down in 2018) and M12, Microsoft’s venture capital subsidiary. She also advises businesses from Silicon Valley starting out in France and co-founded Girls in Tech Paris and Girls in Tech London as well as founding the website Tech.eu.
Last updated: July 1, 2019
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