• The challenges
• The concept
• The founding fathers
• Organization
• The 10 commandments of CI

• The role of the State
• Objectives
• The public system
• The HRIE
• Territorial CI

• Support for strategic companies
• Monitoring and Alert
• Training and research
• CI outside France
• Protection of intangible assets
• Partners

The concept |

Techniques from elsewhere

Taking the example of the successful experiences of Venice and the Hanseatic League, the English were the first to implement the principles of competitive intelligence on a wide scale. Going around the world and dominating it thanks to their war ships and merchant ships, they went out to discover new riches, developed trade and made political alliances. Very quickly, they understood that an effective organization is based on sharing information, networking, exchanging ideas and knowledge and distributing summaries thereof.

In the 1950s, the Japanese developed a system of competitive intelligence backed up by MITI (Ministry of International Trade and Industry) and JETRO (Japan External Trade Organization) to get their economy moving again. This system was developed through the use of an international telex network for their major corporations, tailored to Japanese tastes for intelligence and to the general motivation for modernizing the economy. The quantity of data processed daily from around the world and the supply of analyses to all operators gave them a major competitive advantage. The Americans discovered competitive intelligence toward the middle of the 1980s thanks to Michael Porter. This Harvard professor of business strategy was the first to formulate the concept based on two observations :
  As the market is no longer domestic, but rather has become globalized, this dimension has to be included in business strategy ;
  Control of all of the information needed entails using high-performance technical resources for gathering and analyzing it. The idea was put forward and competitive intelligence progressively found its place in the United States, both in companies and in the administration. This was finalized under President Clinton with the creation of the “Advocacy Center”, which mobilizes all administrations for some fifty contracts considered as being essential to the American government. At this stage, public-private partnership becomes total. Today, many countries are interested in this concept, which the major multinational corporations have already integrated into their practices.

Implementing competitive intelligence in France

Competitive intelligence in France came from the action undertaken by men and women from a wide variety of backgrounds. From the beginning, it has been supported by teachers, civil servants from the prefectures and the intelligence community, business leaders and managers forming associations or schools of thought.

The movement came from decision-makers, often isolated leaders, concerned citizens and others who understood that the knowledge economy is replacing the traditional economy. Information technologies are transforming organizations, changing decision-making conditions and requiring new ways of thinking and acting.

By the end of the 1980s, competitive intelligence was inspiring action by a variety of personalities in such diverse sectors as national defense, academia, the chambers of commerce and business. Individuals from different fields have grouped together in a common diagnosis. Anticipated control of information in a globalized economy is used to organize the market and the world as they want.

Even before becoming a clearly defined discipline, French competitive intelligence is a practice, know-how that is shared between the public and private sectors. The first books and reviews on the doctrine are full of examples of this unusual mixture for France. Innovation and a concern for performance were from the beginning placed side by side with the Nation’s territory and capacities for influence.

For a long time, the word was poorly understood and carried with it certain fantasies related to inexact translations from the English. The idea nonetheless took shape that competitive intelligence, legal and deontological, is first and foremost the ability to understand one’s environment in order to have good information which, at the right time, will make it possible to seize an opportunity or eliminate a threat.

France is running behind its competitors, even though all of the governments of the Fifth Republic have contributed to equipping the country with high-performance monitoring tools and notably public and para-public structures. The first observation in the 1994 Martre report was clear. Policy is necessary in a country where the State plays a driving role that is always criticized but always sought out.

A difficult birth

The first attempt at a public competitive intelligence policy in France dates back to 1995, when Mr. Edouard Balladur, Prime Minister at the time, created the “Comité pour la Compétitivité et la Sécurité Economique”, after publication of the "Intelligence économique et stratégie des entreprises" report. This organization’s work was terminated after the Prime Minister left office. This was a hard blow for the promoters of competitive intelligence. This was the beginning of a long period of time in the wilderness.

The ten years between the publication of the Martre report (Intelligence Economique et stratégique des entreprises, Documentation Française, 1994) and the Carayon report were marked by the constitution of formal or informal groups, sometimes attached to the State such as the IHEDN or INHES" competitive intelligence" groups, sometimes in associations such as SCIP, AFDIE, or think tanks such as the Centre d’Etude Prospective et Stratégique (CEPS).

This was a period of national discussions, conferences, the DEA (Diplôme d’Études Approfondies - a one-year research degree after the bachelor’s degree) and DESS (Diplôme d’Études Supérieures Spécialisées - a one-year work-oriented degree after the bachelor’s degree) degrees which, long before the Masters in the BMD reform (Bachelor, Master, Doctorate), brought this subject into universities, sometimes even into high schools. It was also a period of polemics and debates, as competitive intelligence accepts several approaches, several points of view and strong-willed actors. Long discussions went on as to the contours and content of this area. Where does competitive intelligence begin and where does it end ? While Paris seems to be lagging behind for reasons having to do with State sociology, the regions, more agile and more directly involved on an everyday basis, have become interested in this new tool. It is no longer a question of debating, but rather of saving jobs, creating replacement sectors, avoiding having professions and businesses disappear when faced with competitors or partners who are better informed, more responsive and receive support that remains unimaginable in France.

Some brave prefects and visionary business leaders, as well as elected officials, are making up for the lack of national policy by helping with the initiatives by national or local associations that bring together good will. Organizations such as ADIT (Agence pour la Diffusion de l’Information Technologique - Agency for the Distribution of Technological Information) and the first competitive intelligence firms are meeting the needs of French businesses and local authorities. France is setting up a veritable competitive intelligence market. New professions are appearing. Customers and service providers are discovering the existence of powerful foreign actors who sell intelligence and protection in all forms. Chambers of Commerce are involved in the promotion of this way of acting and thinking. Little by little, French competitive actors are becoming aware of the value of information and its strategic role. MEDEF Paris (the Movement of French Businesses) and other legitimate representatives of companies are seeking to create competitive intelligence academies or institutes. A specialized, quality press is being formed and is contributing to diffusing this concept. More and more books are being published and businesses are meeting to exchange ideas on their practices in original structures or within their professional branches. It wasn’t until the year 2002 that an administrative circular from the Ministry of the Economy, Finance and Industry gave the prefects a "permanent competitive intelligence mission" for "competitive defense". The subject is still subordinated to the spirit of defense, which characterizes French strategic thinking, but the idea is making headway.

On 1 December 2003, in the Foch amphitheater at the École Militaire in Paris, attended by some five hundred specialists, the Minister of the Interior spoke of a report presented to the Prime Minister by Bernard CARAYON, a member of the French Parliament, and made a commitment to a "real, major" public policy based on the thirty-eight proposals in this document. After a long period of silence, the State was back.

On 31 December 2003, in a decree issued by the President of the Republic, Alain Juillet was appointed Senior Director in charge of Competitive Intelligence under the Secretary General of National Defense.

Public policy was to be both defensive and imaginative, legal and respectful of France’s commitments, but without being naive. Starting in January 2004, a Permanent Group for Competitive Intelligence brought together the Ministers concerned with this policy with the Senior Director. Bridges toward civil society have, however, been preserved. The Senior Director invited all French competitive actors, wherever they may be and whatever their size, to participate in this policy on the regional and national levels.