Paris Urban Lab (Paris&Co) — metropolitan urban experimentation platform

Since 2010, Paris&Co — the economic development and innovation agency of the City of Paris (founded 1996) — has operated the Urban Lab, a structured platform for testing urban innovation in real public spaces. Over 15 years and more than ten thematic editions, startups, researchers and city departments have co-designed and deployed experiments on themes from smart urban furniture and air quality to convenience retail and sustainable mobility.

In 2022, Paris&Co and the Grand Paris Metropolis launched the Metropolitan Innovation Districts (Quartiers Métropolitains d'Innovation, QMI), expanding the testbed model to ten metropolitan districts. The OECD Cogito blog (September 2025) described QMI as "Europe's largest urban experimentation program". The programme targets more than 75 urban prototypes across the ten districts by 2026, with live experiments already including eco-designed street furniture (PURPL), mobility monitoring (Ecoflow), cargo bikes for public employees (Pelican Cycle) and solar self-consumption (Faradae).

In 2024 alone, Paris&Co supported over 400 projects through incubation, experimentation and social innovation programmes. Its 320 incubated startups generated 2,528 jobs (averaging 7.9 FTEs per company); startups in its portfolio raised over €600 million in six months. The Urban Lab's international reach extends to a partnership with Tunisia's first private incubator (Wiki Start Up, 2021) and a sports-innovation collaboration with Aichi Prefecture, Japan (2024).

Paris&Co is financed by the City of Paris and committed corporate partners, with a permanent team of 46 people. The agency's 30-year history and the Urban Lab's 15-year track record ensure institutional continuity across political cycles.

Read the full analysis: https://urbanlab.parisandco.paris/