Kempf joined
École Centrale Paris in 2003 and quickly became involved with
VLC. In 2004, it surpassed one million downloads. By 2006, when the project had lost momentum, Kempf took a leadership role, restructuring the team and cleaning up the codebase. In 2008, Kempf founded the
VideoLAN organization to separate VLC from the university. He worked in
San Francisco briefly for the French consulate but returned to France disillusioned. Inspired by
Silicon Valley, he adopted its methods to advance VLC, which reached over 100 million users globally by 2009. In 2012, Kempf founded Videolabs, a for-profit tech startup that develops services and tools around VLC and video in general. This structure allowed him to decline acquisition offers, some of which have reached several million euros. As of 2017, Videolabs sustained both Kempf and the VLC project financially. Kempf has also led the development of other projects, including VLC 3, featuring support for 360° video, and Vizr, a video identification tool similar to
Shazam, which detects films or series being played on a screen and provides additional information. == Honors ==