India First Edition

FRANCE AND INDIA READY FOR THE LEAP

PARIS, October 2, 2008 :Mr Christian Sautter, Deputy Mayor of Paris, in a meeting with CII on “Attractiveness of Paris for Indian companies who want to invest,” at the City Hall in Paris, said here yesterday that the time had come for Indian companies to look seriously towards France and Paris in particular as an investment destination. He pointed out that France’s focus was on India, China, Brazil and Russia.  
He gave four reasons for investing in Paris-

1.Markets-Paris, he said , was the right place from where the investors could reach the millions of consumers  not only in Paris but the rest of Europe as well.It was a gateway to Europe.

2.Out of the 500 global companies , 26 of these companies were located in Paris , 22 in London and 50 in Tokyo.Paris, he pointed out was an important decision making center as well as a financial basis.

3. Paris was dedicated to innovation. It had an active industry which wanted to move into the future while retaining some of its traditional values.

4. Paris  had some 7 Clusters comprising of energy, health , design, technical know how etc.

Mr Sautter, stressed on the strategic location of  France . He said it was in the heart of the European markets. France, he said, had a skilled and talented labor force, a productive work force . R&D was a national priority, he added.. He said that it had the 10 largest Banks in the world  

Mr Dhruv Sahwney, Past President, CII and CMD, Triveni Engineering & Industries Ltd. in his address said that CII had a long association with Paris and he reiterated  Mr Sautter’s views that the time was ripe for looking as Paris as an investment destination that India was looking for partnership with Paris . He pointed out that medium sized companies in India  had started thinking global and  were now looking for investing overseas. He felt that IT was one sector where Paris could look at partnering with India since India was the largest exporter of IT experts. This relationship could be a win win situation for both .

 Mr Sawhney is leading a  34 member CII delegation to France to coincide with the India –EU summit on 30 September, 2008. Some of the other members of the delegation include  Mr baba Kalyani, CMD, Bharat Forge Ltd., Mr Phiroz Vandrevala, Executive Director, Tata Consultancy Services, Dr Surinder Kapur, CMD, Sona Koyo Steering Systems Ltd, Mr Mukesh Aghi, ,CEO, Steria(India) Ltd , Mr Chris Connors, Country Manager-France, HCL Technologies Ltd, Mr Chandrajit Banerjee, Director General, CII, Ms Colette Mathur, Co- President, The Euro India Centre, amongst others.