A Strong Commitment to Innovation
As a leading industrial company in the field of software and digital services for local authorities and public-sector stakeholders, Berger-Levrault places innovation at the heart of its development strategy. In a context of accelerated digital transformation, anticipating future uses, exploring new technologies, and preparing tomorrow’s solutions have become key challenges for competitiveness and technological sovereignty.
To address these challenges, Berger-Levrault has, for several years, relied on a dedicated Research and Innovation department, the DRIT, composed mainly of PhD holders and doctoral candidates. Its mission is clear: to conduct advanced research activities, ranging from fundamental to applied research, in order to develop innovations that will ultimately be integrated into the Group’s products and services.
The research topics explored by the DRIT are deliberately upstream and highly scientific in nature. They include, in particular, AI agentification, dynamic replanning, structured construction of knowledge graphs, and software frugality. By their very nature, these exploratory topics involve a significant level of risk and a non-immediate return on investment, with inherent uncertainty regarding both the results achieved and their industrial maturity.
In this context, national and European innovation funding schemes play a central role in enabling the DRIT to operate, explore, and innovate over the long term.
Financing Scientific Risk: A Key Challenge for Industrial R&D
Research and Development (R&D) is a critical lever for differentiation for industrial companies. However, it also requires accepting uncertainty and exploring paths that may not necessarily lead to short-term, directly exploitable results. Public research support mechanisms are specifically designed to share this risk between companies and public authorities, thereby fostering innovation.
The Research Tax Credit: A Pillar of R&D Financing
The Research Tax Credit known as CIR is one of the main instruments supporting private research in France. It enables companies to benefit from a tax credit equivalent to 30 percent of eligible research expenditures, notably including personnel costs dedicated to research and development as well as subcontracted work entrusted to approved public or private research laboratories.
Through this scheme, Berger-Levrault is able to explore cutting-edge scientific directions, experiment with disruptive approaches, and invest in high-potential deep tech projects that would have required far more time without this form of risk-sharing support. The mechanism therefore promotes a long-term vision of innovation, which is essential for transforming research into industrial value.
CIFRE PhD Theses: Bridging Academic Research and Industry
Another major lever used by Berger-Levrault is the CIFRE PhD scheme (Conventions Industrielles de Formation par la Recherche). These industrial PhDs are based on a tripartite collaboration between a company, an academic research laboratory, and a doctoral candidate.
Lasting three years, CIFRE PhDs enable companies to benefit from cutting-edge scientific expertise from research laboratories, while working on concrete and strategic issues aligned with their business activities. They represent a genuine bridge between fundamental research and its industrial application.
To support the recruitment of doctoral candidates, the ANRT (Agence Nationale de la Recherche Technologique) grants an annual research subsidy to the employing company, significantly reducing the overall cost of the project. For Berger-Levrault, CIFRE PhDs offer a dual advantage: they make it possible to conduct highly upstream research projects aimed at going beyond the current scientific and technical state of the art, while also building a pool of future research engineers.
At the end of their PhD, many doctoral graduates join the DRIT as research engineers, continuing their work and contributing to the gradual integration of scientific results into the Group’s products.
European Projects: Collaborating and Innovating at a Continental Scale
Finally, Berger-Levrault is fully engaged in a European research and innovation dynamic, regularly participating in European calls for projects, notably through research funding programs such as Horizon Europe.
These projects make it possible to address strategic research challenges identified by the European Commission, in collaboration with academic and industrial partners from across Europe. They offer opportunities to compare approaches, pool expertise, and contribute to the development of innovative solutions at the European level.
A Virtuous Circle Serving Sustainable Innovation
Long-term innovation cannot be achieved without a suitable funding ecosystem capable of supporting scientific and technological risk-taking. At Berger-Levrault, mechanisms such as the Research Tax Credit, CIFRE PhDs, and European programs form the foundations of a virtuous circle, enabling the DRIT to pursue ambitious research, attract high-level talent, and progressively transform research into concrete solutions for public-sector stakeholders.
These mechanisms, orchestrated by national and European authorities, therefore play a decisive role in supporting industrial innovation and in preparing the technologies that will shape tomorrow’s products.
