French President Nicolas Sarkozy is scheduled to unveil his plan for the "digital economy on October 13. It's been in the works for months and is aimed at giving France the impetus it needs to catch up to other developed nations.
The man who has been putting the plan together is Eric Besson (photo), whose title translates roughly into "minister for the digital economy." It is likely to call for faster expansion of broadband access toward of a stated goal of providing 100 percent of the population access to the Internet by 2012 and narrowing the digital divide between rich and poor in France. Mr. Besson has also been asked to come up with plans to protect digital rights and to make France a "great nation", digitally speaking.
France already has much more competition in Internet services than the U.S., with a nearly a dozen service providers offering home access. As a result prices are among the lowest in the world, an average of 30 euros or around $41 for a triple play of Internet access, 100 TV channels and telephone service.
Recently, a huge spat broke out that may end up in Mr. Besson's hands. Illiad, the maverick owner of an ISP called Free, objected to a deal between Orange, an arm of French Telecom, and SFR, a big mobile operator, to bring fiber optics access to buildings. Whomever's lines are closest would wire up a buildings and charge the other providers for access, according to the agreement.
Illiad's CEO, Maxime Lombardini, objected to the deal, saying it would give Orange an unfair advantage. Free was the company that forced Internet access prices down, and it is now bidding for a mobile license, where it also promises to lower prices consumers pay for cellphone service.
Mr. Besson works hard to project the image of the modern executive. He offers up a chatty blog of his activities and opinions (http://ericbesson.fr/). Last week,there was a photo of him with Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, announcing the establishment of a major research center in France.
While on a California visit in September, Mr. Besson attended Google's Zeitgeist conference,chatted with venture capitalists, and saw demonstrations of digital "fingerprinting" to protect intellectual property.
The real challenge in next week's plan will be to crank up the French aversion to risks - and spawn more startups and more investment in cutting edge technology. A recent survey of French college students found that more than 60 percent were hoping to land a government job.