Kévin Boutillier

Kévin Boutillier was born on July 18, 1993, in Saint-Lô. His father ran two separate businesses: one in construction, the other in the pinball trade; he specialized in electrical engineering. It was the heyday of the 1980s and 1990s—the golden age of arcades. His mother works as an executive assistant. Kévin is the eldest of three siblings, with two sisters, Estelle and Laura.

From middle school onward, he finds that relationships among peers are not always easy: remarks along the lines of “your parents have a nice car, so you must be loaded” push him to build character, shrug off pointless attitudes, and grow on his own terms.

Around age twelve he discovers the internet, the early days of MSN, and a little HTML programming—computing becomes a passion. Naturally drawn to hands-on work, he often helped his father with DIY: electrics, concrete, tiling. Those years gave him the foundation to build, later on, his own home with his own hands and resources.

After middle school he attends the Curie–Corot vocational high school, then a two-year vocational degree (BTS) in automated systems design and implementation. The program suits him: mechanics, electrical work, programming, machining, a bit of robotics—a hands-on, technical mix in line with what draws him in.

After that, he does not see himself going on to engineering school. He already feels the ground shifting—especially as people often mistake competence for a diploma: to him, stacking years of study for a “decent” degree no longer feels worth it the way it once might have, unless you aim for the very top—a school like HEC, a major American university such as Harvard, or the equivalent—where the years pay off in the quality of work expected and real learning. That is not his goal. He would rather put his energy and money into real estate first.

In 2015 he moves to the Bordeaux area and gains experience at several companies: engineering within the Bénéteau group, a stint at Saft, then Activinside in the dietary supplements sector. For about ten years he worked across engineering and industry in a variety of roles.

Over time, routine sets in: little stimulation, a sense that the technical pace lags behind what he sees in the United States or China, and a nine-to-five rhythm that leaves little room to grow. It no longer works for him.

He turns to entrepreneurship, intending to take charge of what comes next rather than stay in a setup that no longer fits.

Life has taught him above all to listen to himself and to surround himself with people who help him grow a little every day—in business as in his love life. Entrepreneurship is, for him, one of the drivers of his happiness.