Abstract
Antoine Petit is no stranger to computer science, having worked as a researcher in the field and served as President of Inria before becoming President of the CNRS. He first presented the beginnings of research with the pioneers of the years 1960-1970, computer science then being rejected by mathematicians as " not a science ", then the creation of Iria in 1967 under the impetus of J.-J. Lions and the creation of a few pioneering university labs in the early 1970s. This was followed by a period of expansion from 1975 to 2000, with the creation of numerous labs throughout France and the continued expansion of Inria. Finally, from 2000 onwards, the consecration of a mature field, with the creation of INS2I at the CNRS in 2009 and its extension to other sciences, particularly life sciences. The current French situation is characterized by the presence of many players, a respectable position on the international scene (e.g. in the ERC), but a heterogeneous presence on the most " hot " subjects. For the future, eight issues have been analyzed : the challenge of educating society in general, the challenge of openness with the rise of collaborative science and development, the challenge of gender, with women being very under-represented in the field, the challenge of competition with other countries, the challenge of relations with major groups and start-ups, the challenge of massive data, particularly in the sciences, and finally the challenge of SHS in terms of ethics, accessibility and trust with regard to the growing computerization of society and science.
