By Simon Zekaria - 26th May 2004
German economics minister Wolfgang Clement said on Wednesday that Berlin officials are meeting with French counterparts next week to discuss industrial policy cooperation.
Clement is joining chancellor Gerhard Schroder in a high-profile get-together with French prime minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and economics minister Nicholas Sarkozy to break new ground in the creation of so-called Franco-German ‘champions’.
The two European powers see industry consolidation through driven merger activity as a means to bolster competition and national economic growth during the eurozone’s period of fragile recovery.
But although the rhetoric is loud and persuasive, actions on the ground have given out mixed messages.
Both countries, while talking up the significance of joint partnerships in industry, remain guarded over protectionism for national businesses and so pursue an increasing interventionist agenda.
On announcing the meeting, Clement, at the same time as unveiling new domestic antitrust legislation, called for consolidation in the German media industry to protect takeovers from foreign buyers.
“Until now it has always been easy for foreign companies to come in. They can appear on the German market at any time. It is one of our problems,” he said.
Germany has also become increasingly concerned with French industrial policy.
Clement’s declaration came on the same day as comments from chairman of French engineering firm Alsom, Patrick Kron, that the group would not countenance a merger deal with German telecommunications operator Siemens to fulfill a competition caveat on a rescue package.
Sarkozy has also declared a preference to keep the company within national hands, notwithstanding the need to keep any transaction fair according to the market.
Siemens is known to be considering legal action if the company is shut-out of the carve up of the company.
It is not the only incident to ruffle feathers.
Berlin was also angry with Paris over an interventionist stance in the Sanofi-Synthelabo/ Aventis merger in pharmaceuticals – a deal keeping the company in domestic ownership after a rival bid from Swiss-based Novartis was rejected.
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