LVMH renounces to install its research center near Polytechnique in Saclay

The luxury group LVMH is renouncing to install its research center on the Saclay plateau (Essonne) near the Polytechnic School, which nevertheless gave the green light to this facility last November despite the opposition of several students, we learned from Polytechnique on Monday.

Contacted by AFP, LVMH specified that the group “continues the research association” valued at 2 million euros a year for five years with the engineering school, “but is advancing towards land outside the Saclay plateau for the installation of its research center research”.

“Work on sustainable materials, a theme that is part of the project to create the new interdisciplinary center on materials, will be implemented. Exchanges on the other two identified research topics, namely Data and AI, and Life Sciences, will also continue,” he adds. polytechnic.

300 researchers in 22,500 square meters

In November, the Polytechnique board of directors had validated the sale of land near the engineering school on the Saclay plateau to the luxury group to install a research center there, a project that had been opposed by students and alumni of X.

The deliberation was validated by 19 votes in favor, 4 against and one abstention.

The project of the world number one in luxury, called LVMH Gaia, should finally bring together 300 researchers in an area of ​​22,500 m², according to LVMH, which intends to invest more than 100 million euros in the future building.

Officially announced in July, LVMH’s project on the Saclay plateau had met with opposition from X students and alumni grouped in the “Polytechnique is not for sale!” collective.

In their press release on Monday, the École polytechnique and the Institut Polytechnique de Paris indicated that they would continue to “develop the innovation park intended to host research and innovation activities, beginning with the ongoing examination of a shared research building project “.

A year ago, the Totalenergies group had given up on installing its new research and development center on another site, also close to the Ecole Polytechnique, after the mobilization of teachers and students who opposed the project.