Long perceived as a niche technology, data streaming is now establishing itself in France as a key element of companies' digital strategies. According to the Data Streaming Report 2025 published by Confluent, the perception of data streaming is evolving: it is no longer just a promise of innovation, but an essential lever for addressing two major challenges: data governance and AI management.
A Foundation for Industrializing AI
If 79% of French decision-makers now demand seamless integration between AI/ML and streaming platforms, it's because they clearly perceive the stakes: without real-time, contextualized, and governed data, AI struggles to deliver actionable results. However, only 35% of respondents in France consider feeding AI systems with continuous data as a key lever of streaming, compared to 87% globally. A significant gap that raises questions: is it a cultural lag in adopting the real-time logic, or a methodological caution dictated by infrastructure and governance constraints?
While 93.5% of French decision-makers identify at least one major barrier to AI adoption: data fragmentation, skill shortages, quality issues, data streaming emerges as a promising solution to streamline data access and accelerate AI industrialization.
Globally, decision-makers believe it improves customer experience (95%), risk management (92%), automation (91%), and product innovation (90%). IT leaders place data streaming among their strategic priorities at 86% (84% in France), behind security (94%) but ahead of AI/ML (83%).
Govern the Complexity: Streaming as an Architectural Lever
Beyond AI, the IT architecture itself becomes the field of experimentation. In a landscape marked by system stacking and technical debt, streaming platforms are seen as simplification mechanisms. However, in France, only 51% of companies have integrated this technology into critical systems, compared to 60% globally.
According to Confluent, this more cautious adoption reflects a market evolving towards progressive industrialization, centered on efficiency.
Profitability, Budget, and Trade-offs: Streaming as a Response to Constraints
Data is no longer just a strategic raw material, but an economic asset whose profitability is becoming a central criterion. In a French context marked by the reduction of public support mechanisms for innovation like the Research Tax Credit and pressure on IT budgets, streaming emerges as a pragmatic response: 38% of French companies report having achieved an ROI of at least five times their investment, a figure that is growing though still below the global average (44%).
The 'shift left' logic, which involves anticipating governance and data quality issues from the early phases of the lifecycle, appeals almost unanimously to French decision-makers (98.5%).
Niki Hubaut, Country Leader France at Confluent, concludes:
"What we observe in France is a rapid evolution in the perception of data streaming. Long seen as an innovative technology, it is now becoming a foundation of resilience and performance for French companies. In an increasingly fragmented digital landscape, streaming platforms play a key role in ensuring data quality, accessibility, and governance, essential prerequisites for making AI a truly operational lever."