From: telecompaper

French digital economy minister Fleur Pellerin told Les Echos that she would invite a half a dozen of her European counterparts to Paris at the end of September for informal talks about internet taxation, investment and personal data rights in the wake of the Prism revelations. The discussions will pave the way for a European Council meeting on 24-25 October, the first summit of EU heads of government dedicated to the internet and innovation.

In the interview the minister argues that Europe needs to create the tools to allow its start-ups to become heavyweights and to take back power over internet giants’ platforms which today dictate their law on how the internet works. Pellerin states that the two objectives are linked because today the internet giants are monopolising the value chain and curbing the emergence of new European players.

In France, Google accounts for 96 percent of searches, she said, acknowledging that this is of course due to the quality of the service offered, but asks whether such a “colossal” market presence should call for regulation. Competition law is an inefficient punitive tool because of the time it takes to reach a resolution. In the case of Microsoft, this took 10 years, “an eternity in the world of new technologies”.

She wonders whether it is not time to go beyond competiton law and invent new, ex ante tools to act before the damage is done, citing the case of her own country, where telecom regulator Arcep summons operators to resolve conflicts before they appear and thereby to guarantee platform neutrality.

The minister refers to investment and standards (“normalisation”) as other priorities, saying that while Europe led with GSM in the 1990s it is now following the US and Asia in LTE. “Let us not miss out on the internet of things, with 50 billion connected objects expected in 2020. To regain its sovereignty in the digital economy, Europe should concentrate its actions and its digital investments on four or five critical segments, including big data, cybersecurity and the cloud”, she concludes.