Brussels, 21/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - Neelie Kroes, European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda, held a meeting on 20 March with the CEO of France Telecom-Orange, Stéphane Richard. This meeting took place at an open event attended by many representatives from the European Commission, European Parliament, member states and industrial bodies and organisations. The event was organised by Orange, an operator active in 10 European countries. It sought to illustrate the operator's determination to become involved in “constructive and sustainable dialogue with the European authorities”. Richard presented the assembly with 10 commitments in key areas of the digital economy. He explained that “these commitments put into practice Orange's involvement with the European Commission in the implementation of the digital agenda for Europe, as well as its determination to promote growth and jobs”. The event also enabled participants to discuss the current challenges faced by the telecoms industry, as well as help them identify possible areas of cooperation and mutual expectations on the part of Orange and the Commission.
Orange's commitments are grouped around three objectives: (1) high-speed communications, (2) service consolidation, and (3) the group's social responsibility. In the context of the first objective, Orange would like to create 4G/LTE networks in 15 European countries where it is active, in addition to very high-speed fibre-optic networks for 50 million households in France and 80% of companies by 2020, as well as generally participating in the provision of very high-speed communications on European markets. With regard to service consolidation, Orange is proposing that in the area of cloud computing it will offer companies throughout the European Union secure access to quality services from data centres devised ecologically and located in Europe, which guarantee customers full ownership and easy, safe data recuperation (reversibility). The operator is also proposing to its 3 million customers Near Field Communication (NFC) payment terminals from 2012 and for 10 million customers from the following year. It also aims to develop enriched interpersonal communication services at Rich Communication Suite (RCS) standards in five European countries from 2013, and to allow a third of all hospitals in the European Union and 20% of European citizens access to digital applications in the health sector. With regard to social responsibility, Orange is setting out several objectives in the area of personal data protection, particularly by providing its clients with a personal data scoreboard by 2015. The operator is also seeking to develop mobile cover in Africa and the Middle East for 80% of the population and also contribute to gender equality by increasing the rate of women in management levels in the company from 23% to 35%, as well as fighting for greater energy efficiency and reducing its company CO2 emissions by 20% up to 2020 (on the basis of 2006 levels). (IL/trans.fl)