EY publishes its 2021 France Attractiveness Survey

Despite the Covid-19 crisis, France’s attractiveness held up well in 2020. France has retained the position it acquired in 2019 as the leading European host country for foreign investment, ahead of the United Kingdom (2nd) and Germany (3rd).

What’s more, among the projects identified, France is once again the leading host country for manufacturing investments and for research and development.

France has proven to be particularly resilient in terms of welcoming manufacturing projects, with the decrease recorded in France for this type of project (-17%) being lower than that seen in the whole of Europe (-22%) and much lower than that observed in Germany (-37%).

In general, the healthcare, logistics, financial services, energy, water and waste treatment sectors have been safeguarded or supported by the crisis. France stands out in particular for welcoming healthcare projects. It was the country with the most projects in this sector in 2021 and it recorded a 123% increase in the number of projects in the pharmaceutical industry. Furthermore, it received 40% of all investment projects in medical and surgical equipment.

The attractiveness of France’s regions is also highlighted in this survey:

Ile de France/Paris region is the second leading European region for investment projects, after Greater London.
Three French regions are among the top five European regions for manufacturing investment projects: Grand Est, Hauts de France and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes.

Foreign entrepreneurs are very confident that France will be able to overcome the crisis, with 44% of business leaders questioned on the French Recovery Plan believing that it performs better than those in other countries. Meanwhile, nearly three-quarters of foreign entrepreneurs (74%) anticipate an increase in France’s attractiveness by 2025. Finally, 50% of managers say they plan to relocate business activities to France within the next three years.