Articles
RSS SubscribeWednesday 26th April 2006
Chirac announces plans to boost technology
by CORDIS
French President Jacques Chirac has announced funding for six new large technology projects aimed at boosting France’s industry and lagging economy.
The announcement comes at a time when France is lagging behind in Europe and globally in terms of investment in research and technology. The President pointed to China, which spends fives times more than France in the area of research, and the fact that there was only one French company in a recent listing of top 30 world companies investing in research.
Partial funding for the projects will come from France’s newly established industrial innovation agency (AII), which has received a total of €2 billion from the State in order to champion innovative technology at national as well as European level.
The President described the agency as the very 'catalyst' that would help France to generate excellence in industry and services, and create new and highly-skilled jobs. By investing in science, innovation and industry, France will be able to move away from its image of a 'museum-country', he added.
Among the 'ground-breaking' projects which have received funding are 'Quaero', a Franco-German initiative to design a powerful multimedia search engine, which its developers claim is capable of rivaling market giants such as Google and Yahoo; NeoVal, an ultra light train using energy-storage technology; and BioHub, a method to produce plastics from starch. The agency plans to fund a total of 30 such projects by the end of the year.
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