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Antoine Ughetto co-founder and CEO of Makemepulse
A 2006 graduate of the Concepteur Réalisateur Multimédia program, Antoine Ughetto co-founded the makemepulse studio with Nicolas Rajabaly, also a graduate of the school.
With offices in Paris and London, makemepulse is one of the world's top 10 independent digital production studios. The studio works daily with major brands and renowned advertising agencies (Orange, Ubisoft, Estée Lauder, Netflix, BETC, MullenLowe, BBH...) with the ambition of creating tomorrow's digital experiences, integrating innovative technologies (AR, VR, WebGL, AI...).
You graduated from the Concepteur Réalisateur Multimédia program in 2006. Can you tell us about your career path and how it has evolved since you left the school?
My career started at GOBELINS with my work-study program. I was a full stack developer at AGF Informatique. It wasn't the most creative environment, but it gave me an insight into the environment of large groups and gave me a better idea of my career aspirations.
At the end of my studies, I joined Publicis Net, the agency of the Publicis Group, which was the digital agency of the moment and which produced great digital operations, with a lot of Flash and interactive creation. This experience enabled me to build up a network in the world of advertising, communications and interactive design.
I then set up makemepulse in 2008, with Nicolas Rajabaly, who was in the same year as me and whom I'd joined at Publicis. There were just two of us at the start, and now there are around forty! So my job and responsibilities have naturally evolved. I went from backend developer to fullstack developer, and then naturally moved into a management position as makemepulse grew.

©makemepulse
What motivated you to take this step?
We both wanted to be entrepreneurs and do something for ourselves. When we launched our structure in 2008, our initial ambition was tooffer a service linked to music and live performance, we dreamt of a start-up and web 2.0. That's where the name "makemepulse" comes from- it was a mistranslation at the time, referring to the rhythm of music.
Thanks to our developer background, we started out on dev- and technical-oriented subcontracting assignments for Publicis and former colleagues. One thing led to another, and the music service project disappeared completely to make way for the interactive and creative production studio.

"Inside kristallnacht" - makemepulse.
You offer a wide range of services. Can you tell us about a particular project that illustrates Makemepulse's DNA?
We work directly with brands as well as with agencies. In France, the notion of a production studio is often limited to execution. For our part, we seek to go beyond this by offering our customers genuine strategic support, positioning ourselves as true partners in their thinking.
Projects vary greatly from one customer to another. For example, we recently worked on the design of the launcher for League of Legends for Riot Games. We rethought the artistic direction of the launcher for the launch of a season, integrating 3D elements. This project focused on the design aspect, with less emphasis on the technical side.
Our latest project, which best represents themakemepulse DNA, is "Inside Kristallnacht ", an interactive documentary in which we relive Kristallnacht through the eyes of a survivor. We worked with the Claims Conference Foundation, which is responsible for preserving the testimonies of Holocaust survivors.
It was very interesting to think about how we could use our expertise to make this testimony interactive. The idea was to enable people to live the experience in an immersive way, by really putting themselves in the narrator's eyes thanks to virtual reality. It's always rewarding to be able to work on historical and cultural projects that have meaning and speak deeply to the teams.
This type of project allows us touse technology (in this case, our nanoGL real-time 3D engine) to serve a message and design an experience that's a little different.
We are also particularly fond of gaming projects. For example, we've collaborated on games with Yuga Labs, the world's largest web3 and NFT company, best known for creating the " Bored Ape ". We design real games with gameplay mechanics.
To better structure our offer and be recognized for this playful aspect, we have also developed an offer called " makemeplay ".

"HV-MTL The Hunt" - makemepulse
Have you had the opportunity to collaborate with other alumni of the school?
I've worked with GOBELINS alumni throughout my career, through makemepulse of course but not only. In particular, I've collaborated on projects with alumni from other classes. We continue to follow each other, and it's great to see how others evolve.
We recruit a lot of GOBELINS students on sandwich courses. These are profiles that interest us and that we enjoy working with. We also have a number of alumni working for us , and not just alumni from our training program.
For us, GOBELINS in general is a guarantee of quality profiles.
You have offices in Paris and London. Why did you make this choice?
When we launched makemepulse, our ambition was to position ourselves among the world's top creative studios.
There are a lot of opportunities in France, but we wanted to go beyond our borders. To succeed in becoming a top studio, we had to expand internationally. Projects with Riot Games and Meta gave the studio a new scope.
We also initially wanted to offer our employees the chance to work internationally, particularly in England and the USA, through our various offices.
Our strategy has changed a little, and we're now remote-first. We prefer this approach, which leaves more flexibility to the teams with whom we work in total confidence. They can come to the Paris office whenever they like, of course.
England seemed to us to be a good gateway before the United States: it was simpler and less costly at the time, and it enabled us to recruit English-speaking staff. With the Brexit, the situation has changed and England has become less attractive since leaving Europe. Despite this, we have retained our London office, where we have staff, mainly for commercial activities.

"Anima Quad" launcher experience - makemepulse
How do you see the interactive design sector evolving, particularly with the arrival of AI?
The sector has already undergone a number of changes. AI is obviously a new cycle, and only time will tell how transformative this one will be.
When we created makemepulse , the golden age of the interactive web was already drawing to a close. Between 2006 and 2010, brands were spending heavily on interactive standalone sites with animations. Then they moved on to networks, and content evolved. People used to stay on sites for a long time, but now we're used to scrolling and consuming a lot of video on social networks.
That's why we've recalibrated our projects, and now offer more games and integrated interactive content. We're still working on immersive projects, but more for the cultural and documentary sectors, two areas that have a greater need for this medium and a different approach.
We're only at the beginning of AI from a technological and consumer point of view. There has been a revolution with LLM and generative AI, which have changed production methods, but for the moment we're still a long way from the magic of AGI that people are trying to sell us. Models are evolving very, very fast, as we've just seen with Deepseek, so we need to remain vigilant and curious about developments.
We're integrating AI into all our workflows, for both developers and creatives. But we use it as a kind of superpower for our teams , not as a replacement for our employees or as a means of producing faster and at lower cost. Once again, our aim is to provide quality and craft above all else, and AI must be at the service of this ambition.
Can you tell me one good memory from your year at GOBELINS?
GOBELINS has played a decisive role in my professional and personal life. It was there that I met Nicolas, with whom I created makemepulse, and above all my wife, with whom I now have a child.
If I had to pick one speaker, I'd sayÉtienne Mineur was the one who made the biggest impression on me. Meeting him and discovering his vision of things was a transformative experience, which opened my eyes to creative possibilities.
The energy within the class was also very stimulating, with a real team spirit that pushed us to evolve and progress. We also learned a lot from each other.
What advice would you give to a recent graduate?
Stay curious! The industry has gone through 500 different evolutions. There was the end of Flash, the start of dynamic HTML sites, the GL web, augmented reality, virtual reality, NFT and blockchain, and now AI. It's a profession and a sector that demands constant evolution; you have to be in tune with what's being done, and follow the trends.
Another important element is to have a good first professional experience , so that you can meet the right people who can help you learn a lot. This is what will enable you to progress in your career.
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