Three founders were building from Paris, closed seed and Series A rounds, and are now scaling in the US. Not long ago, they were where most early-stage founders are: a first version of a product, a handful of contacts, and no clear idea of how you get from there to a round, let alone to Silicon Valley.

You've heard the advice a hundred times: "build your network," "just get to Silicon Valley." But what does that look like in practice when you're just getting started? Hear about the first intros that mattered, the pivots, the first weeks in SF, the investor meetings that went nowhere, the one that closed the round. Told honestly, from the inside.

On stage:

  • Dan Elkaïm, Co-founder of Topo

  • Arseniy Shishaev, Co-founder of Superlog

  • Kabir Sethi, Co-founder of Bitstack

Three companies, three different routes. Join us for a great night of real talk & meeting cool people.

What to expect:

  • The Panel – Maxime Arnulf (Pioneers) sits down with all three founders for a live Q&A on:- The first 12 months: what they did before anyone knew who they were, how they built their first network from Paris, and which contacts actually turned into co-founders, customers or investors.

  • Paris vs SF: what changed the moment they landed in Silicon Valley, when they knew it was time to go, and what they'd never trade about building from Paris.

  • Raising seed: what closing their round actually took, step by step, and what they'd do differently.

  • Drinks & Networking – The part where you put it into practice, in the room, with the people sitting next to you. The STATION F team will be there too: if you're just starting out and wondering how to make the most of the campus, come say hi.

Who it's for: Founders in the earliest stages of building, whether you're on campus already or thinking about it.

Agenda:

  • 18:00 – 18:30 – Doors open

  • 18:30 – 19:30 – Panel discussion + Q&A

  • 19:30 onwards – Networking

Hosted by Landing Zone × Pioneers

Landing Zone by STATION F is the flexible workspace for founders who want to start building on campus before joining an incubation program. You get a desk at STATION F, access to a community of 1,000+ startups, investors and partners, and a team on hand to help you find your way from day one.

Pioneers is a talent investor for ambitious European founders. We look for people who've excelled somewhere hard – frontier science, elite sport, the military, the best technology companies – and back them at the earliest stages, sometimes before they even have a team or an idea. French ex-NASA engineers building underwater drones for EU defence. A Dutch ex-Stanford researcher building biotech infrastructure for EU labs. We bring 40 people like this together in a batch for three months, invest €100K in the top-performing teams, and take them to Silicon Valley for a month.📍 Station F - Founders Café 🗓️ September 30: 18:00 - 21:00