French president visits tech titans in SF

France's president met with Silicon Valley executives and government leaders in the heart of tech country Wednesday, just days after a French regulator hit Google with an embarrassing regulatory slap.

President Francois Hollande was greeted at San Francisco City Hall by Mayor Ed Lee, California Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom and former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz as school children waved French and American flags on the stairway of the rotunda.

More than 300 French companies have offices in California, and a large portion of U.S. investments in France are from California, Hollande told the crowd at a City Hall reception in his honor.

"It is here in California that the world of tomorrow is being invented," Hollande said. "For centuries, France has wanted to change the world. Together, we can."

Hollande points to the U.S. tech industry as an economic success that he hopes to replicate at home. But he's also been among the leaders of Europe's fight to prevent what the continent sees as a systematic attempt by tech firms to invade privacy and avoid paying their corporate fair share.

Over the weekend, Google posted a statement on its French website noting that France's digital privacy watchdog found the search giant in violation of rules on ensuring data privacy.

Hollande's advisers insist his first priority was to meet leading dynamos of American Internet innovation, even though the president would press France's principles on issues such as privacy and taxes.

Later in the day, Hollande and members of his cabinet had lunch at a French restaurant with Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt; Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook; and Twitter chairman and co-founder Jack Dorsey.

Most of the luncheon was closed to the media, and no details of the discussions were released.

Hollande later met with French entrepreneurs and inaugurated an office in the gritty Dogpatch neighborhood aimed at supporting their efforts to gain a foothold in Silicon Valley. That meeting also was mostly private.

Marie Buhot-Launay, who heads marketing for the office, said staff members were giddy that Hollande was throwing government support behind the venture, given the intense competition French innovators face from competitors in Germany, Finland and Ireland.

"For French entrepreneurs, the American dream still exists and especially in Silicon Valley," she said. "This new support will really help them accelerate their growth, and help us scale up the services we provide and build a larger network of mentors and investors in France and in the U.S."

The Associated Press