Agence France-Muséums was set up on 11 July 2007 in Paris, in accordance with the intergovernmental agreement signed between France and the United Arab Emirates on 6 March 2007.

The capital of Agence France-Muséums, a simplified joint stock company , is held by twelve public cultural establishments:

• the musée du Louvre,
• the Centre Pompidou,
• the Etablissement public du musée d’Orsay et du musée de l’Orangerie,
• the Bibliothèque nationale de France,
• the musée du quai Branly,
• the Réunion des musées nationaux,
• the musée et domaine national de Versailles,
• the musée Guimet,
• the Ecole du Louvre,
• the musée Rodin,
• the domaine national de Chambord,
• the Etablissement public de maîtrise d’ouvrage des travaux culturels.

Agence France-Muséums has been entrusted with the task of carrying through the commitments of France to the project of the universal museum of the Louvre Abu Dhabi and structuring the expertise of the French cultural institutions involved. It provides consultancy services to the authorities of the United Arab Emirates in the following fields:

• Definition of the scientific and cultural project,

• Assistance to the project management,

• Loans from French collections and the organisation of temporary exhibitions,

• The creation of a permanent collection,

• The museography, the signage and the multimedia projects,

• The museum’s policy on visitors

Agence France-Muséums signed a contract for providing services with its Emirates counterpart Tourism Development & Investment Company on 7 January 2008. This contract sets down the list of services to be provided by Agence France-Muséums over twenty years. The agency, in accordance with the intergovernmental agreement of 6 March 2007, is financed entirely by the authorities of the United Arab Emirates.