THE BLOG

DPO Consulting chooses the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis

With its location in Vence, on the territory of the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis, the DPO Consulting group, a consulting firm specializing in personal data protection, intends to support businesses in the Alpes-Maritimes, Var, Hautes-Alpes, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, and Corsica.

Interview with Isabelle MAURETTE, Director of the Nice office and personal data protection consultant at DPO Consulting Southeast.

Can you tell us about your company and your activities?

DPO Consulting was founded in Paris in 2015. Its founder, Marine Brogli, had anticipated the entry into force of the GDPR, the European regulation on personal data protection, in 2016.

Our support offer for public organizations and businesses of all sectors and sizes meets the need for organizations to comply with this new regulatory framework, not only to avoid financial sanctions but also to integrate the societal impacts of personal data management and establish a lasting relationship of trust between the company and its clients.

Success was immediate with a rapidly growing demand from businesses. hus, in 2017, DPO Consulting opened several offices in the regions of Occitanie, Grand Ouest, Bourgogne Franche-Comté, and the Southeast region, led by Sylvain Chemtob, which includes our offices in Nice, Lyon, and Marseille.

DPO Consulting now has 60 employees, including 15 in the Southeast region. We do not hesitate to share our experiences for the benefit of our clients.

Around the themes of data protection, compliance with the GDPR and the French Data Protection Act, our support comes in several formats:

Outsourcing of the DPO function (Data Protection Officer)
Compliance audits
Analysis of maturity of practices and associated action plans
Assistance and DPO expertise for the implementation of recommendations
Training and awareness-raising actions

Our aim is to become a Business Partner for the organizations we support. We are facilitators whose role is to enable companies to improve their skills in these areas and ensure that their operations take place within a legal and IT compliance framework that will not impede their development.

Why did you choose to set up on the French Riviera?

Our set up on the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis is part of our plan to strengthen our territorial network and our desire to reinforce our proximity with our clients.

This proximity is essential to better understand the specificities of the territory and of each organization and company that we support.

By establishing ourselves on the territory, we are anchored in the heart of a dynamic ecosystem that includes many centers of excellence where data is central.

The richness of the biotech and information technology ecosystems, such as artificial intelligence, metaverse, or blockchain, allows the territory to be very efficient and recognized nationally and internationally. These pioneering companies in innovative technologies can use our services to, for example, integrate privacy principles (Privacy by Design) into the design of their products and services.

We are receiving more and more requests from companies in the health sector that are required to integrate artificial intelligence into their solutions, and in this field, the processing of data, considered sensitive, is a crucial point for their development.

Beyond technological innovations, our offer also targets the hotel industry, which is required to manage an increasing amount of personal data and, like many other sectors, collects or transfers data internationally, requiring the implementation of protections on data transfer processes.

DPO Consulting proposes to support these companies and public organizations towards compliance with their processing. Indeed, financial sanctions for breaches of the GDPR can be heavy for the company (up to 4% of the company’s worldwide turnover).

What support are you receiving from Team Côte d’Azur?

The support from Team Côte d’Azur has been excellent. It allowed us to accelerate our integration into the local ecosystem: we were able to meet and exchange with Telecom Valley, French Tech Côte d’Azur, the SCS Cluster, the Nice Côte d’Azur Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis.

For any new company that establishes itself in a territory, it is important to get involved, participate, and contribute to the local economic life.

Moreover, since we are present in a sector where the number of actors is limited, we are inclined to support professional associations in order to raise awareness among their members about data protection.

We were also supported in discovering the different solutions for business real estate, especially the coworking offer of the Nice Côte d’Azur Metropolis.

Due to our influence over a large territory and always with the objective of strengthening our proximity with our clients, we joined the NoMad Coworking space in Vence, which allows us great flexibility in organization.

Team Côte d’Azur has been a real accelerator of our local integration.

What are your development prospects?

After a few months of activity, the demand for data protection consulting has increased and we have advanced the recruitment of a first consultant, initially planned for the end of the year. We are also evaluating the possibility of quickly integrating an intern. Within three years, we hope to have a workforce of 5 to 6 people.

We continue to promote our SaaS software solution, my DPO, which makes it easier to manage GDPR compliance and is open to all organizations, whether they have worked with us previously or not. Our goal is really to enable companies to be more serene in managing data protection so that they can focus on their business issues.

Finally, as part of our integration, we also want to raise awareness among local actors, so we are available to participate in awareness-raising events to transmit the basics of data protection.