JUSTIN COOK The Roanoke Times

Jim Flowers (left), director of VT KnowledgeWorks, says the idea for the workshop came about when faculty from Telecom & Management SudParis — a business and engineering school in Paris — visited Blacksburg in April 2008.

JUSTIN COOK The Roanoke Times

French engineering and business students and two faculty members from a business and engineering school in Paris join a group from VT KnowledgeWorks to learn about American-style business during a workshop at Mountain Lake.

| Amy Matzke-Fawcett

amy.matzke-fawcett@roanoke.com, 381-1674

PEMBROKE -- French and English floated across the room as two groups gathered around the living room of a cabin at Mountain Lake.

The French group consisted of five French engineering and business students and two faculty members from Telecom & Management SudParis, a French business and engineering school in Paris.

The others were from the Blacksburg-based VT KnowledgeWorks, the firm hosting the group to help the students learn about American-style business.

The workshop was part of a week-long prize trip the students won in the Annual Entrepreneurial Project at Telecom & Management SudParis for creating Multeegaming, an on-demand video game platform for PCs that allows players to challenge each other to games.

"It was exciting, because it was the first time in our lives the teachers and administration told us to create, to choose our subject," said Vincent Morel, a member of the team that created Multeegaming, of the challenge.

The collaboration was part of a strategy to develop international ties between Tech and international entrepreneurs.

Each member of the team started the visit by shadowing an employee of a local tech company, including NewCity, Click and Pledge, Rackspace, Modea and TeleWorks.

The exchange gave both the students and companies the chance to trade ideas about online business, said Kamran Razvan, CEO of Click and Pledge, an online donation management platform based in the Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg.

In an online-based business, like Multeegaming or Click and Pledge, marketing and developing relationships across borders are vital, Razvan said.

"I hope to learn about a new culture and new concepts of business," said Damien Lavergne, the student shadowing Razvan. "A good company, one that is successful, understands the market in more than just one country."

The seeds for the trip were planted when school faculty visited Blacksburg in April 2008, said Jim Flowers, director of VT KnowledgeWorks.

That's where they met Flowers, who traveled to France in December 2008, and again this June. During the June visit, Flowers attended the awards ceremony where Multeegaming was awarded the winning prize by Christine Lagarde, French Minister for the Economy, Industry, and Employment.

"We began to talk more and think more about collaborating," Flowers said.

Ideally, the winning team from SudParis each year will make a trip in the fall and then spend the next summer working in Blacksburg in cooperation with VT KnowledgeWorks, Flowers said.

With their new knowledge, the students hope to have a more finalized business plan by November, and the company up and running, including Web site, by the spring, Morel said.

"The state of mind is different in Europe," said Florent Merian, a member of Multeegaming. "By mixing the European way and the American way, we want to find solutions to work all over the world."

The trip is a "working payoff," Flowers said, because the students can make connections to help get Multeegaming off the ground, as well as have a vacation.

The group also attended a welcome dinner hosted by Virginia Tech Outreach and International Affairs, a "French for Business" course at Tech, and the Virginia Tech-Marshall football game and alumni tailgate.

Although the trip was focused on making connections, the football game was possibly the most exciting part of the trip, the students said.

They had even prepared for the game by watching videos on YouTube, Merian said.

"For us, it's something incredible to see all the people gathered," Morel said.