Chambre de Commerce et Industrie de Foix where hi-tech enquiries are referred to a local toyshop
Photo:Martin Castellan/Sud Media Images
It was 1998 in Foix. I had been to the Chambre de Commerce in search of the person responsible for the digital economy in the département of Ariège. They had given me an address. Now I was admiring myself in a toyshop window.
A more pragmatic person would have taken this as an omen and gone somewhere else. They would have run. Anywhere would have done, Toulouse, Barcelona, Afghanistan, but I was driven by a suicidal mix of principle and missionary zeal.
I had arrived from the UK the previous year. My twenty year former life had started in computing and then graduated to helping businesses to make best use of it. Along the way I’d collected references from banks, telecommunications operators, retail chains in Britain and the United States.
Like Groucho Marx, I wouldn’t want to join any club that would have me as a member. Nevertheless several learned institutes both sides of the Atlantic had elected me, apparently under the impression that I knew what I was doing.
I had done my apprenticeship, got my knees brown, been around the block, helping companies exploit the Internet since 1989. Most importantly, I’d been a consultant for the European Commission using broadband to stimulate rural economies. Ariège was certainly rural.
We had had real success. In 1992, tourists to Greece could see virtual flyby tours of their chosen region’s landscape, driven by data from Landsat and Spot satellites. In the west of Ireland they could download video tours of their preferred hotel. There were call-centres in farthest Friesland and remote working centres in rural Portugal. British Telecom was running the UK’s national directory enquiries using teleworkers in the north of Scotland.
Not bad for 1992.
Fast forward to 1998 - The economy in Ariège was based on staple industries such as textiles and paper. It was struggling, faced with competition from the Far East where they didn’t have French employment laws or worry about pollution. Here in the Pyrenees, mills were closing, unemployment was rising. Jobs had become the main exports.
I wanted to bring my successful e-business consultancy to France with me; Perhaps I could help my adopted land at the same time. The digital economy offered a way forward. If I could make a difference on the Aegean island of Santorin, why not here in Ariège?
I had a cunning plan. With my track record in setting up call centres and customer service operations, it ought to be possible to set one up in Ariège and attract business from northern Europe. We would be in the same time zone as the customers.
Managed groups of teleworkers, based around a local telecentre, should be able to attract back-office work from companies in Paris and beyond.
Ariège had a secret weapon, the RN20, a main trunk road which ran from Paris to the Spanish border. The EU knew it as the E9, a european artery from Brussels to Barcelona. It passed through Ariège and then snaked through the mountains to Catalonia.
The RN20 was due for an upgrade, some of it would become autoroute. Then Ariège could host e-commerce operations able to deliver either north or south.
A railway line ran alongside the road. From Foix station, one could buy a ticket to Toulouse or Barcelona. All this meant that we could seek clients in the Catalonia, a province with 6 million catalans, the wealthiest people in Spain.
So I set off in search of whoever was running the digital economy in Ariège, starting with the Chambre de Commerce de Foix. I used all the right words “l’économie numérique”. When that didn’t work I asked for who dealt with the IT sector, “les SSII, les societies de service d’ingénierie en informatique”.
Finally, after 30 minutes of Gallic shrugs, white smoke wafted from the chamber chimney. They had come up with an address. Ariège's e-business champion, who would shape the economy for next decade or two, sold computer games.
I had seen the future. It was built from Lego and staffed by Cindy dolls.
