Op-ed published in French in Les Echos.

A generation away from losing control of our technological sovereignty, and then of our sovereignty quite simply, both collectively and individually, we urgently need to find within ourselves the mainsprings of survival and independence.

As a technological Cassandra, the good doctor Laurent Alexandre has been telling us in his columns, books and media appearances that we are going to be crushed under the domination of the GAFAs and other BATXs. According to him, it would be too late to try and rise again, we Europeans, and in particular the French, being outstripped by the stockpiles of data and advanced AI know-how of other nations.

Laurent Alexandre is right. We are at a crossroads, and the future will see our children facing the American Eagle and the Chinese Dragon, helpless as the Incas greeted Pizarro. A generation away from losing control of our technological sovereignty, and then of our sovereignty quite simply, both collectively and individually, we urgently need to find within ourselves the mainsprings of survival and independence. I believe that we can still hope.

Two reflexes can save us. The first is to give up the false currency of technology, which gives us the illusion of counting, but which is in reality no more than an anecdotal parade. The second is to choose our own natural strengths and bring them to a level of excellence that will make us inescapable.

Renouncing false technological currency

Counterfeit technology means tech companies confusing success with fundraising. Venture capitalism, which may have some virtues, has been taken to the extreme. It has become a “casino economy” from which entrepreneurs almost always emerge losers, ruined or dispossessed. Dependent on funds raised often too quickly on unrealistic business plans, they are like capitalist junkies on a cash drip. Who can believe that a social network that has made nothing but losses since it was founded can be worth a thousand times its turnover? It’s a smoke and mirrors situation.

It is vital, for the health of our economy and our tech industry, to reject entrepreneurial objectives that have no connection with the real economy: the emergence of “unicorns”, mega-raises or the size of IPOs cannot be an end in themselves. Ultimately, the only indicator that counts is the profit generated by technology companies, old and new, and their investment capacity.

Let’s go back to the fundamentals of capitalism: “the social responsibility of the company is to increase its profits”, as Milton Friedman teaches us. By this, the Professor means that the virtuous foundation of investment in quality and innovation, of sustainable employment, is real profit. The providential expectation of a magic “pivot”, the key to future profit, exempts investors from any form of critical thinking. This is a slow and destructive poison for investment.

Become recognised experts to prevail

The second way of winning our technological sovereignty is to make a conscious decision to become the leading nation in one or two sensitive areas, rather than spreading ourselves too thin in the heady rush to explore all directions.

Two centuries ago, David Ricardo formalised the theory of comparative advantage: a country that specialises in an area in which it is already the best will enjoy greater wealth and commercial influence, even if it means giving up other areas. So let’s make some collective choices to redress both our technology deficit and our trade balance. French Tech, a promising concept, must not be a bazaar for inventions, but a precise spearhead recognised as such by all other nations.

France has historically had two technological strengths that are at the heart of the digital economy. One is computer programming, and the mathematics and statistics that underpin it, and the other is computer-generated imagery. Our code whizzes and statisticians are exported everywhere and are at the heart of the construction of artificial intelligence. Artificial intelligence will be for the next thirty years what the Internet was for the previous thirty: a decisive tool of political and economic soft power. The recently announced Villani-Macron plan is a step in the right direction, but we are still a long way from getting it right.

In the field of imaging, unrivalled gems such as Dassault Système, inventor of the Katia modelling software, and the prestigious Gobelins school are leading the way. It’s important to understand that the interfaces between people and machines have not changed since the invention of the computer – the keyboard and the mouse – even though mobile phones have recently reshuffled the deck. In the future, virtual worlds and new graphic interfaces will be at the heart of digital creation, both for work and leisure.

We therefore need to radically prioritise all our training, public investment and political will in these two technological fields. At the same time, we must not sink into a new, dirigiste “Computing Plan” that is doomed to failure. We need to define priorities and subtly guide our economic and research organisation through non-planning public policies.

Overcoming paradoxes: realpolitik tech

To conquer our technological sovereignty, we need to accept the paradox of loving the market and wanting strong political intervention in the definition of national and European research and investment priorities. We need to put our trust in the private sector, while remembering that a company’s primary duty is not to shine after another round of financing or a flotation, but to generate substantial and lasting profits. In short, we need to be pragmatic and, dare we say it, realpolitik.