EDF was a partner of the 26th Laval Virtual exhibition on virtual and augmented reality.
Crédits photos : Groupe EDF
Last month saw the 26th international exhibition dedicated to immersive technologies, Laval Virtual. During this event, the biggest players in the XR community gathered together. But the event also attracts companies from other business sectors, who see VR/AR as a potential source of development and performance for their activities. This is the case of the French EDF Group, who have shown its interest by being a partner of the exhibition, and by recently creating a Group task force: “XR and immersive experiences”. We spoke to Christian Taillebois, Communications Manager for the Pays de Loire region, and Mathieu Truchet, IS Project Manager and national leader of the task force.
Laval Virtual: a springboard to attract tomorrow’s talent
In an interview last year, when EDF was already a partner of Laval Virtual, Christian Taillebois explained the importance of following and supporting future XR professionals. In 2024, the French Group has renewed its partnership on student competitions. “More and more teams are working in technology at EDF and its subsidiaries. There are careers to be made with us, and we want to attract these future experts,” confirms Christian Taillebois once again.
This partnership with Laval Virtual also exists to show that innovation is at the heart of EDF’s concerns. “Within the Group, there are a lot of use cases, a lot of interest and, above all, a thirst for information about immersive technologies. We’re looking for solutions that can help us improve performance, safety, quality and lead times.” EDF’s participation in the exhibition last year enabled the Group to observe that many businesses are interested in immersive technologies. 2023 was a turning point for EDF, with the rise of the extended reality issue. As a result, a cross-functional task force has recently been set up.
115 players involved in extended realities
Mathieu Truchet, Task Force Leader, explains to us the ambitions of this “XR and immersive experiences” working group: “The aim is to bring together all the active forces interested in these subjects within the EDF Group, including the subsidiaries“. In all, 115 internal and external players are taking part in this task force, including EDF subsidiaries such as Edvance, Enedis, Dalkia, Framatome and Exaion. They include players in industry, engineering, operations, hydro, nuclear and renewable energies.
“Our aim is to create a strong community to bring together and share ideas and solutions around extended realities. In the long term, this task force will make it possible to organise the future of XR within the Group, to rationalise and optimise our operations around these uses and to anticipate its uses by 2030.” In this last area, an event like Laval Virtual enables EDF to keep an eye on the latest trends and current and future immersive solutions. This year, Laval Virtual brought together 190 exhibitors and attracted more than 6,000 visitors from all over the world to get inspired and discover the best of XR.
