Thierry Dubois has specialized in aerospace journalism since 1997 An engineer in fluid dynamics from Toulouse-based Enseeiht His expertise extends to all things technology in Europe Thierry is also the editor-in-chief of Aviation Week’s ShowNews Thales Launches MEMS-Based Inertial Measurement Unit is published in Aerospace Daily & Defense Report an Aviation Week Intelligence Network (AWIN) Market Briefing and is included with your AWIN membership Already a member of AWIN or subscribe to Aerospace Daily & Defense Report through your company? Login with your existing email and password Not a member?  Learn how you can access the market intelligence and data you need to stay abreast of what's happening in the aerospace and defense community insight and analysis from our award-winning editors delivered to your inbox daily Discover how Paris 2024 became the most media-covered Olympic Games in history See how the Olympic Games’ communications team supported by Wiztrust’s tailored PR platform overcame complex challenges-from synchronizing teams and managing thousands of journalists to ensuring top-level security Learn how innovative digital tools and expert support enabled Paris 2024 to achieve record-breaking visibility and flawless brand protection Download the full Paris 2024 Success Case now and get inspired by the strategies behind this record-breaking achievement For further information and other cases please visit Wiztrust.com protect your company and its directors from disinformation and adopt the “trust mark” of the market leaders plan campaigns targeting your audiences through all channels (e-mail social media) and organise your activities and events improve results by exploiting your data's true depth Discover the best way to manage your PR & Marketing efficiently: Wiztrust is THE integrated communication platform for corporate professionals Prioritise your activities thanks to a clearer view on your assets Manage your communication thanks to a collaborative platform for you and your team Certify your corporate communication thanks to our blockchain-backed technology Save your team and yourself some precious time Learn more about Wiztrust in our case study You don't have permission to access the page you requested What is this page?The website you are visiting is protected.For security reasons this page cannot be displayed Returning to France in the middle of an uprising… The kneeling teenagers are in Mantes-La-Jolie a poorer banlieue of Paris that is very Black and Arab The Minister of Education insists that the children were placed in this position to be kept safe while the police searched them for evidence relating to an act of vandalism committed nearby The image is unsettling and instantly becomes iconic In the car on the way to the rehabilitation facility where my grandfather is recovering from surgery we listen to people call in to a radio show A man in his 70s expresses dismay at the excess of force He’s old enough to recall France’s flirtations with fascism Another feels certain that kids in the wealthy Parisian Sixth Arrondissement would never be subjected to the treatment reserved for the banlieue A woman calls in and says the children are savages before her racism graduates from innuendos I never thought I’d be following the gilets jaunes protests from France this weekend, but my grandfather is unwell. He fell while opening the door of the fridge, but the doctors say his femoral neck was already broken by the time he lost his balance. It’s the kind of thing one can expect from living with a Paget diagnosis a rot of the bone tissue that sharply curves the body of its hosts When I called my grandmother on the phone the previous weekend she said the surgeon inserted a nail into his hip and closed him up in an hour He’d awakened but she warned me that he struggled to recognize faces His 89th year here has not been very kind to him she’d looked for a black coat in town (no luck) I nodded as though she could hear it and bought a ticket home my grandfather was a real paysan—a blacksmith and a farmer he derived immense pleasure from manual labor climbing on ladders and fixing stuff himself so he wouldn’t have to give another man an extra penny until Parkinson’s made his hands shake too much and the medication clouded his mind I remember being drawn to the steady strike of the iron emanating from his shop on the edge of the farm I’d wait for a pause to ask him what he was making we’d have nothing more to say to each other so I’d go back to my thing He was stern with children—with his own son and with his next two granddaughters—but he was better with adults I can still see him at family reunions in the ’90s singing gaily for the party to the accompaniment of his accordion We arrive at the treatment and physical rehabilitation center in Loudun the second closest town to the village after Richelieu He is in the silk pajamas that my grandmother has brought him so that he doesn’t have to wear the hospital gowns I’d never seen my grandfather in pajamas before this week he was always up and working by the time I got up I’d also never placed my hand on his shoulder tenderly or caressed his hand to stop him from reaching for his hallucinations until now either We stay for two hours until he falls asleep and I are all glad that this fall has opened my grandmother’s eyes to the fact that she needs a home aide to help care for her husband such a suggestion would create financial anxiety but this is not America so money never really comes up No one frets over how much the stay will cost or whether the doctors are injecting him with generic medication Whatever the end of the road is for our family it will not be pages of billing and harassing calls from debt collectors so my grandmother knows that when she does ask for help My father is often astonished when I tell him what things Americans must handle without support from the government The gilets jaunes crowd is diverse in age and race and gender and politics but it is more white and middle-aged than you think The news anchors have a hard time identifying the heads of the movement or its political leanings The demonstration began with an online petition denouncing the hikes in the fuel taxes set to become effective in January 2019 and urging people to protest the higher prices over 50,000 protesters descended upon Paris Their signs evoke the revolts of May 1968 and the French Revolution of 1789 Some call the President “King Macron” and call for his immediate resignation young radicals from the left and the right It is hard to say exactly what everyone wants nor is it a traditional movement where a slate of leaders set demands and take the uprising from there I suspect the demands that have made it into the government’s hands don’t reflect the views of all the movement’s adherents when one poll shows that 40 percent of the gilets jaunes voted for neofascist Marine Le Pen in the presidential election 20 percent voted for leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon and only 5 percent voted for Emmanuel Macron they denounce their American peers on the left for cheering the uprising on the captain of the Center for American Progress ship the left claims a revolt against neoliberalism and centrist policies intended to shield the rich and let the working class shoulder the burden of combating climate change I envy the latter’s seemingly complete confidence in the gilets jaunes The lines between conservatives and progressives in France don’t track American politics cleanly the American centrists are unfair to characterize the demonstrations against the fuel tax as ignorant of the importance of fighting climate change France is less tolerant of climate change skepticism and the closest Marine Le Pen gets to denial is expressing a preference for continued debate on the extent to which global warming is man-made which is miles away from openly calling the whole thing a hoax with each year marked with canicules — weeks of merciless heat that test the agricultural regions’ will to survive the fields of rapeseed and wheat on the way to the village are greener than in the late summer Then there’s the uncomfortable reality that the French far left and far right share an anti-immigration protectionist instinct derived from the same strain of chauvinism The French are also further to the left in general than Americans They have a different baseline of expectations from their government which puts them to the left of the American neoconservatives and libertarians on economic matters I don’t know exactly where my father stands on the gilets jaunes my father’s support of the gilets jaunes depends on whatever he thinks will get a rise out of my stepmother He’s a centrist in earnest and voted for Macron in 2017 but has said to me that he feels disappointed He thinks Socialist ex-president François Hollande was a president to the poor and Macron is a president to the rich He doesn’t have any great insight on the gilets jaunes other than sympathy for their exasperation It’s not just that my grandfather may be dying a factory where he has toiled for almost forty years This is a cyclical problem for them but this time could mark the end of the factory Its finances were in such dire conditions that a judicial administrator has been installed until February by which deadline the factory must find a party willing to buy it for 20 to 30 million Euros While I cannot find statistics on Châtellerault’s unemployment I’d bet my grandparents’ farm that it is higher than the national average Some of these youths would do anything for my father’s back-breaking My grandmother is mostly annoyed by the looting from last week This is what the coverage has disproportionately focused on—the windows broken last Saturday and the stores cleaned up by people who maybe were or maybe weren’t associated with the demonstration Some merchants in the capital board their windows and hire discrete private security details sales for the holiday season sales are down from last year although no one can say if it’s the protests The government has mobilized 89,000 officers around the country in a more aggressive effort to prepare for the next confirmed round of mass protesting They are arresting hundreds of people who haven’t done anything yet They insist that they will not deploy the army People seem certain that the violence will be worse this time and there are multiple calls for people to protest in their home regions rather than Paris When we visit my grandfather a second time on December 8th the protest is in full swing and broadcast live on the television in his room The Champs Elysées and the Place de la Bastille are emptier than expected which may have to do with the government’s draconian round-up of protesters in advance of trouble so eventually the cameras turn back to more tense exchanges and eventually recycle footage of riot cops nabbing protesters and exchanging tear gas grenades The press has little time to waste on the two dozen or so demands remitted to the government by those protesters who became prominent as the movement gained traction they air interviews of protesters denouncing the window-breakers a hundred different ways My grandfather’s eyes glaze over and I’m not sure he knows about the unrest outside of his room He seems more alert today and perhaps recognizes me but I’m not sure he quite grasps how unusual it is for me to back so soon Despite the ball burning through my throat but it beats becoming a movement with no demands Beyond demanding a halt to the fuel tax scheduled to become effective in January 2019 the gilets jaunes ask for a lower tax on energy products and instead suggest that the government raise a tax on maritime fuel and on kerosene They also demand subsidies for cars that run on hydrogen rather than electricity They call for de-privatizing the gas and electricity providers and demand lower taxes on small businesses and individuals (note here that the French pay significantly more in wage taxes than Americans) prioritizing the support of small businesses over large corporations and chains and an end to the collection of credit card fees from merchants and ask for additional investment to get unemployed people back to work and more training programs to transition workers into new positions They ask for an increase in the minimum wage and a parity in work protections afforded to French workers and foreign workers working in France and in the French territories They ask for a review of the limits applicable to renting assistance They demand an end to the closures of smaller post offices along with more inclusivity measures in all aspects of life including cultural activities they ask for a mechanism in the constitution to trigger referendums a return to the seven-year presidential term from the current five-year term and an end to lifetime salaries for presidents of the republic I recoil at the more reactionary asks: a pause on policies that encourage immigration while France is in supposed crisis a more forceful requirement that foreigners integrate in French life (including through language and knowledge of the country’s history) and an elusive demand that products that “belong to France” no longer be sold abroad and in places like airports The faint smell of nationalism and xenophobia The reactionary asks don’t work for my brand of radical politics but my skin is black and my blood Cameroonian Closed borders engender violence and pain and the European Union should take more refugees and make it easier to transition from being undocumented to having papers But the economic asks are ambitious—a Christmas wish list as the centrists on the RTL radio deride it on Monday morning—and there are more of them than the xenophobic line items I catch my flight back for the United States on Monday I am not sure my grandfather will make it through the week and I am not sure my father will be able to hold on to his job through his original retirement date and I am not sure whether I’ve missed a glaring element with the gilets jaunes but without a clear political direction among the protesters—outside the shape given to the demonstrations by the demands—I worry that this wave will peter out when everyone goes home to their families for Christmas Eve I hope they hang on long enough to get their most progressive economic and social asks Macron will address the nation after a glaring stretch of silence The analysts on the news say that his silence was to avoid fueling more anger of the gilets jaunes ahead of the larger demonstrations although his suppression of the protesters speaks volumes his government has announced the suspension of the fuel taxes for at least six months We are not told whether to expect more concessions The French protesters have pledged to continue blocking the roads until they feel heard As the protesters now suiting up in yellow vests in the Netherlands and Belgium will tell you If you appreciate our work, please consider making a donation, purchasing a subscription, or supporting our podcast on Patreon Current Affairs is not for profit and carries no outside advertising We are an independent media institution funded entirely by subscribers and small donors and we depend on you in order to continue to produce high-quality work Cornel West sits down with us to diagnose the spiritual maladies of our time Don't miss this fantastic edition packed with insights and art Every other week 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The following rules apply to the use of this site: Terms of Use and Privacy / Cookie Statement | Privacy settings Thales today announces an innovative technology – with the creation of a new Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) creating a breakthrough in navigation solutions built on Thales's proven TopAxyz IMU technology is the result of extensive investment not only in research and development but also in advanced production facilities with state-of-the art technology and expertise in inertial navigation The result is a more resilient navigation system which is more compact (20% smaller) lighter (10% less) and less power-consuming Published: September 2022 - Pages: 194 pages GPS jamming and spoofing operations have become increasingly common affecting the navigation of both civilian and military platforms across all environments - air Therefore reliable and trustworthy real-time navigation systems that withstand these external threats are essential The TopAxyz new IMU maintains resilient navigation capability "With the introduction of MEMS technology Thales opens a new chapter of its fifty year history in advanced inertial solutions," said Florent Chauvancy “This new generation IMU integrating MEMS is a technological and industrial breakthrough towards ever more resilient and competitive navigation solutions Weight and Power consumption and best-in-class performance.” Thales Modernises the World-class TACTIS Armoured Vehicle Training Centre for the Royal Netherlands Army The European Main Battle Tank Development (FMBTech) Project has Been Launched to Develop the Technologies Behind the Tank of the Future MGCS Project Company Gmbh (MPC) Established in Cologne Thales Delivers Complete Set of Dual TWTs for the Optus-11 Satellite Thales to Supply NATO With Latest-Generation Situational Awareness Solution to Ensure Decision Superiority Kopin Secures $7.5M Contract for HMDS Supporting Aircraft Pilots Collins Aerospace Enhances Capabilities to Speed Marine Corps Decision-making in Battle Teledyne FLIR Defense Awarded $74.2M Contract for US Army's Next-Gen NBC Reconnaissance Vehicle Sensor Suite Upgrade Multi-Domain Wide-Area Surveillance System CACI Awarded $54M Task Order to Support the US Army with Advanced Ground Sensors Elevate Your Business with Our Market Studies and LEGO® Magic Foreign Affairs has been the leading forum for serious discussion of American foreign policy and global affairs The magazine has featured contributions from many leading international affairs experts CAMILLE PECASTAING is Senior Associate Professor of Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies Camille Pecastaing Emmanuel Macron, France’s former economy minister, who led the first round of presidential elections on April 23, will very likely be the Fifth Republic’s next leader. He is widely expected to win the May 7 runoff against Marine Le Pen of the National Front and after his reasoned performance at yesterday's presidential debate, he is up in the polls with 63 percent of viewers finding him the "most convincing" candidate as unprecedented as it would be for the centrist candidate who has never held elected office will not necessarily give him governing power France has a hybrid constitution whereby the regime is presidential like that of the United States when the president’s party holds a majority of seats in Parliament and parliamentary like that of the United Kingdom when it does not is set up to favor the established parties (or “Onward!”) stands little chance of winning more than a small fraction of seats in June This means that the center of power for the next five years will fall not to the president but to the prime minister languishing in the Elysian palace as a potiche (literally “decorative vase”) meet the same fate in 1997 after a badly called election leaving him politically impotent for five years aligning the terms for president and Parliament to five years each Voters were expected to choose their executive and legislature in the same breath one Gaullist (right of center) and the other Socialist (left of center) have dominated French politics since the birth of the Fifth Republic in 1958 And although the presidential post will elude them for the first time in nearly six decades the two traditional parties will retain their grasp on the legislature All the commentaries about seething resentment among the electorate and the growing appeal of populism miss the point that far-right Le Pen surpassed two men that the public found dull and corrupt The Brexit and Trump votes were one-round shockers The French Presidential election takes two rounds allowing enough time for a rally against an extreme right abhorred by an overwhelming majority of the French It would take an improbably low turnout for Le Pen to get even close to her opponent The parliamentary election that will follow in June is a district-based two-round ballot biased in favor of established political parties Electoral leakage to National Front and En Marche from the two mainstream parties will be far less than what occurred during the presidential vote eloquent figures to project themselves far and above the mass of more experienced politicians and President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau more recently captured the popular imagination and inspired voters It takes experienced political machines to get the votes Unless those machines were to defect en masse to Macron’s movement—and there is no sign of that happening—candidates running for En Marche are positioned to lead in the parliamentary elections After five years of a highly disappointing socialist administration the electorate wants to punish the Socialist Party whose candidate in the presidential election scored an abysmal six percent of the votes the Republicans have swiftly turned the page on their troubled candidate It is generally accepted that the scandals were personal Fillon scored an admirable 20 percent in the first round Polls now suggest that even though the Republicans may not carry an absolute majority of the seats it is poised to be the leading party in the next legislature That will place legislative and executive authority in the hands of a center-right prime minister proved that there was a strident rejection of the old Gaullist leadership which includes former President Nicolas Sarkozy Fillon’s defeat opens the door for a younger generation of leaders from the Republicans to take over the party and claim the prime ministership The contenders are educated and experienced technocrats has held several prestigious ministerial portfolios and was first elected to the Parliament in 1993 is an attractive figure who has won difficult elections for the party and served in several ministerial positions given the importance of gender parity in French political culture at the moment and given the necessity to stand out against Macron A daring choice would be Christine Lagarde a former finance minister who became managing director of the International Monetary Fund in 2011 she is a political outsider who has never run for office—she had a successful career as a lawyer before appointments in government Highly regarded among Europe’s leaders for her actions throughout the euro crisis she would be able to easily impose her authority bruised by a fraud scandal not of her own making but that occurred while she served as finance minister may prefer to stay away from the grind of French politics the battle among the Gaullists for the prime minister’s seat competent women brought into government during the Sarkozy administration made a bid for the prestigious mayorship of Paris in 2013 and ran against the old guard in the recent presidential primaries her abrupt demeanor may have lost her those two elections and may disqualify her for top positions The name that comes up more and more frequently among Gaullist voters is that of Valérie Pécresse Pécresse is a graduate of the prestigious École Nationale d’Administration and has shown great reformist ambitions during her five years in government both as a party apparatchik and as a member of Parliament since 2012 Although she lacks Largarde’s stature and does not have the grit of NKM her smoother personality may be the best suited to jostle with Macron holding the reins of power will not automatically elevate the prime minister above a president brought to office by the popular vote Macron is a political newcomer whose appeal is personal and without comparable precedent impeccably trained in the best French tradition and a former investment banker who married his onetime high-school teacher Macron surged on the political stage when he became minister of economy in 2014 at the age of 36 he is not easily identifiable with either the left or the right an ambiguity he cultivated by declining an affiliation with the Socialist Party while serving in a socialist government and his mild antiestablishmentarianism distinguish him from a tired clique of politicians many have lost faith in But his status as an outsider will also be his limit over whom Macron will have no real institutional authority will draw power from his or her party’s control of the legislature the center-right prime minister would push much-needed reforms through the Parliament and Macron would use his charisma and energy to sell those reforms to the people the best-case scenario rarely comes to pass With similarity comes the risk of intense and paralyzing rivalry but as president he could thwart the prime minister by issuing constant criticism of his or her actions in his first cohabitation with Jacques Chirac had become quite adept at undermining his prime minister in anticipation of winning the next presidential contest—which he did and his party was then able to then put Socialist Michel Rocard in the prime ministership Even if the president and prime minister were to get along their cooperation would confirm the perception that Macron is a wolf in sheep’s clothing and that his social posturing was nothing but a pretense to cover a liberal economic agenda Following the disappointing administrations of Sarkozy and Hollande condemned for failing to reduce unemployment and to prevent dramatic terrorist attacks the French Republic could face five more years of stasis The challenges that await France’s leaders are daunting Despite its potential—the French are well educated and highly productive—the country has been under-performing for decades because of a heavy fiscal burden and overregulated labor markets Past governments have continuously struggled to effect significant change because the reforms that would stimulate growth and create jobs are almost systematically killed by massive popular protest On top of those longstanding domestic issues Macron and his new prime minister will have to tackle Brexit and the security challenge imposed by the new U.S administration’s desire to pull back from NATO Pushing European integration forward at this time requires a partnership with a strong France and an even stronger Germany Macron has already earned the respect of political and intellectual leaders across the Rhine the long-standing Chancellor Angela Merkel and the former President of the European Parliament are mainstream politicians with a robust commitment to the European Union the German chancellor and the French head of state and government will share an agenda that favors strengthening Europe improving productivity and competitiveness in the global economy and extending a helping hand to those left out by globalization or displaced by foreign wars the quality of their relationship is yet untested It will take France’s June parliamentary election and several months of cohabitation to figure out whether the new leadership in Paris will be in rather toxic mode for the next five years Subscribe to Foreign Affairs to get unlimited access Already a subscriber? Sign In Liana Fix and Peter Sparding Hans Kundnani Giovanna De Maio and Célia Belin Fintan O’Toole Ivo H. Daalder and James M. Lindsay Tong Zhao Zongyuan Zoe Liu Anne Neuberger Liana Fix and Michael Kimmage * Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply to your newsletter subscription Published by The Council on Foreign Relations Privacy Policy Terms of Use From the publishers of  Foreign Affairs This website uses cookies to improve your experience You can opt-out of certain cookies using the cookie management page * Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply to your newsletter subscription Which language would you like to use this site in France: Systemic Police Discrimination Requires Reforms Groups Initiate Class Action Suit on Discriminatory Identity Checks Police in France engage in a longstanding  and widespread practice of ethnic profiling that constitutes systemic discrimination a group of six French and international human rights organizations said today as they initiated action  the first class action against the French state over the practice  The organizations sent a letter of formal notice on January 27 to the prime minister and the interior and justice ministers to press for structural reforms and concrete measures to put an end to discriminatory police practices Despite incontrovertible evidence that French police have engaged in systematic discrimination during identity checks for many years and commitments by successive governments to address the problem The class action suit is needed to end this stigmatizing a lawyer before France’s Council of State and Court of Cassation prepared and filed the formal notice on behalf of a group of local national and international organizations united in their expertise and commitment to combating discrimination They are the Maison Communautaire pour un Dévelopement Solidaire (MCDS) The formal notice includes testimony from numerous victims of discriminatory identity checks in cities across the country as well as affidavits from police officers that confirm bias in law enforcement One of the victims cited in the formal notice said he has repeatedly experienced ethnic profiling by the police since he was 16 “sometimes three times a day.” During a recent stop the police “put me violently up against the wall One of the officers touches my private parts he hits me in the stomach and calls me a ‘dirty Arab.’” the evidence demonstrates a pattern of discrimination that cannot be dismissed as isolated or sporadic incidents The Defender of Rights, France’s national human rights institution, has repeatedly criticized discriminatory identity checks and called for reform the Court of Cassation ruled that police stops of three young men constituted ethnic profiling and a “gross misconduct that engages the responsibility of the state.” The 2016 law to modernize justice in the 21st century allows class action suits to tackle discrimination and empowers the court to provide a range of remedies including ordering the executive branch to adopt systemic reforms The January 27th letter of formal notice is the beginning of a four-month period for negotiations among the parties after which the organizations can take the case to the courts if they are not satisfied with the steps the government pledges to take Deep structural reforms are needed to address systemic discrimination Piece-meal measures such as the use of body cameras by the police are insufficient Based on years working on police discrimination in France and elsewhere the organizations said that the government needs to carry out a constellation of reforms as a whole Recognizing the importance of the issue, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) issued a general recommendation on “preventing and combating racial profiling by law enforcement officials” in November CERD emphasizes that not only is racial or ethnic profiling unlawful it “may be ineffective and counterproductive as a general law enforcement tool.” The organizations’ initiative comes at a time of profound crisis in police-community relations in France Following the savage beating of Black music producer in late November 2020 by four police officers the latest in a series of incidents of racialized police abuse President Emmanuel Macron acknowledged the problem of ethnic profiling by the police He announced that use of body cameras by police agents would become standard and that the government would create a new reporting platform for police abuse with the participation of the office of the Defender of Rights and nongovernmental organizations. Macron also announced that a consultative process would start at the end of January involving law enforcement The organizations are concerned that the president’s announcements and the consultation will lead once again to superficial and insufficient measures The procedure the groups initiated should spur the government to tackle the specific problem of discriminatory identity checks and its deep causes in line with France’s obligations under national and international law undertake the necessary structural reforms Together we can fight for human rights everywhere Your donation can transform the lives of millions If you are talented and passionate about human rights then Amnesty International wants to hear from you Listen NowSaveShareDownloadPlaxtil co-founder Jean-Marc Neveu with used face masks in the factory where they are transformed John LaurensonA decontamination machine that looks like a large tumble dryer bathes hundreds of used face masks in the glow of ultraviolet rays Welcome to a French recycling facility where face masks — worn and thrown away by people all over the world — are turned into plastic objects like phone holders and coat hangers our business was making plastic parts for the aeronautic and car industries,” he said asking us if we could do anything with the tons of clothes they receive but aren’t good enough to be sold.” their response was to come up with a recipe They transform the plastic that makes up 70% of some textiles into plastic mush That process put the company into good position to recycle masks during the pandemic we were all ready because disposable masks are practically all plastic fiber we have transformed 25 million of them,” he said made from used face masks.John LaurensonSurrounded by recycling machines a Plaxtil employee shows one of the things they make out of masks: school kits — ruler set square and protractor — in bluey-black Plaxtil has made 100,000 of these for municipalities that distribute them for free in schools where Marjorie Lopez is in charge of procurement “We put recycle bins in all our City Hall offices Some firms also wanted them — the railway company and the Crédit Agricole bank The municipality has more than 200 bins in all It pays about $90 per 500-mask recycle bin to have the masks picked up sorted and transformed into things customers can choose Sign up for the Marketplace newsletter to get the day’s biggest business stories straight to your inbox every weekday evening Please enable JS and disable any ad blocker Healthcare the Autorité issues today a decision regarding the planned acquisition of Audilab hearing aids distributor by the Demant group the Autorité identified competition issues in the hearing aid product distribution market in three catchment areas The Demant group responded to these concerns by making a commitment to divest itself of some hearing centres to a competitor to maintain sufficient competition in this market The Autorité therefore decided to clear the transaction subject to the condition that Demant divest itself of two retail outlets The Demant group is one of the main manufacturers of hearing aid products in Europe It also engages in distribution activities through the networks of the companies Audika and Bauhaud which have 570 and 15 hearing centres in France respectively Audilab is a major retailer of hearing aid products When it examined this previous transaction the Autorité considered that the new entity was likely to harm competition in 12 local catchment areas the Demant group made a commitment to divest itself of eleven hearing centres These markets are characterised by retail outlet openings and closures so the local areas analysed in 2015 are not all the same as those analysed for this transaction This competitive analysis takes account of the current structure of local markets in the 154 catchment areas where the parties' activities overlap After a detailed examination of the transaction's effects the Autorité found that the transaction would significantly strengthen the Demant group's presence in the hearing aid product retail distribution market in 3 catchment areas (Apt Châtellerault Blossac and Châtellerault Foch) the parties' retail outlets together hold large market shares and existing competitors cannot exert enough competitive pressure to constrain the new entity's behaviour the Demant group has made a commitment to divest itself of 2 integrated centres These measures will maintain a balanced competitive situation by preventing the accumulation of market share as a result of the transaction The divestiture of one hearing centre will thus address two competition issues in Châtellerault These measures will ensure the consumers concerned have a competitive and diversified market for their purchases of hearing aid products William Demant will be prohibited from acquiring the divested hearing centres > See the full text of Decision 19-DCC-244 of 11 December 2019 JONATHAN FENBY is the author of France: A Modern History from the Revolution to the War with Terror, and Director of European Political Analysis at TS Lombard Jonathan Fenby the political maverick and former French economy minister defeated Marine Le Pen of the far-right National Front with around 66 percent of the vote on Sunday he became the youngest ever president of France and the first with no previous experience as an elected official as astounding as it was for an outsider candidate with only a fledgling political party cannot merely be explained by the French population’s frustrations with globalization and terrorism The reason lies deeper in France’s past than that; in fact the story begins with the string of failed presidencies that the country has had to endure since the passing of the early epoch of the Fifth Republic the leader of the Free French resistance forces during World War II who identified himself obsessively with his country believed it could only be ruled by a strong executive president He established the new republic in his image as France faced the threat of civil war from a military revolt in Algeria and amid the disintegration of the political establishment The strong executive presidency was meant to bring a fractious nation together and enable France to become a global leader The constitution that was adopted in 1958 made the French head of state an elected quasi-monarch And yet successive presidents have fallen well short of the Gaullist ideal of strong leadership was an urbane former banker who lacked his predecessor’s historic stature He set the country on a more business-friendly course allowing the United Kingdom to join what was then the Common Market He was a pragmatist who lacked the charisma of his patron and cut political deals the general would have rejected and the Gaullists split at the subsequent election in a manner that went directly against the idea of rising above partisan politics When Valéry Giscard d’Estaing took the reins in 1974 the brilliant former finance minister introduced important social reforms and worked closely with West Germany He had trouble holding together a ruling coalition with the Gaullists especially during the oil crisis of the late 1970s He was tripped up by his own sense of superiority on top of allegations of corruption namely that he had accepted diamonds from an African dictator Jean-Bédel Bokassa of the Central African Republic (briefly renamed the Central African Empire between 1976-79) offered only lukewarm support and the president was widely seen as having retreated from his initial reformist stance into a conservative defender of the elite became the Fifth Republic’s first president from the left in 1981 A veteran politician who had held his first ministerial post in 1947 Mitterrand led the Socialist Party into an alliance with the still-powerful Communist Party and the liberal Radical Party He arrived in the Élysée Palace with a radical left-wing economic program in which major companies were nationalized The ideas proved unworkable as inflation soared and the value of the franc plunged the left lost local and European elections and the economic situation forced Mitterrand to reverse course He soon adopted orthodox austerity policies that generated high unemployment he manipulated the electoral system to help bolster the National Front and damage the mainstream right Forced to appoint the neo-Gaullist Jacques Chirac as prime minister after the opposition won legislative elections in 1966 but his second term was marred by economic problems and scandals He succeeded Mitterrand in 1995 and held the presidency until 2007 (The presidential term was cut from seven to five years in 2002.) His administration made its international mark by opposing the invasion of Iraq but Chirac did little to improve life in France He did not come to grips with the country’s economic and employment woes and neither did he address the growing tensions within immigrant communities that boiled over into major riots in 2005 It was only through rather unfortunate circumstances for his opponents that he won reelection in 2002 He received an overwhelming victory after the first round of voting pushed the National Front’s Jean-Marie Le Pen ahead of the Socialist Lionel Jospin who had run a poor campaign and had to battle an array of minor contenders splitting the left-wing vote Chirac’s second term was a reprisal of his first with little action to put right France’s growing economic and social problems Germany launched a major program of reform that turned it into even more of an existential challenger as the leader of the European Union That finally brings us to more recent times with two one-term presidents Nicolas Sarkozy came into office in 2007 after a career marked by a vigorous promotion of law and order as Interior Minister as did his promises of serious structural reform to the economy constrained as he was by the conservatism of his supporters a growing lack of will to battle vested interests the international financial crisis of 2008 and his own reputation as a “bling” president who embarrassed the office as he and his wife a long-time Socialist Party back-room manager riding to victory in 2012 on the back of Sarkozy’s extreme unpopularity and the impact of eurozone austerity on living standards Hollande came to office pledging sweeping tax increases to pay for reflation propelling him to veer between leftist policies of high taxation and increased public spending and right-leaning market reforms It did not help that his personal life was also in disarray He made headlines when he was caught riding on the back of a motor scooter between visits to his partner in the Élysée and his mistress down the road His approval rating sunk to four percent at its lowest point Although he reacted firmly to the wave of terrorist attacks that hit France in 2015 and 2016 This catalogue of failures at the top of French politics explains the rise of non-mainstream candidates in this year’s presidential election The exasperation that has been building for several decades has finally burst through and the two major parties have both shot themselves in the foot—the Socialists by picking a left-wing candidate who divided the party and the center-right Republicans by the scandals over allegedly illicit payments their candidate supplied to his wife Macron embodies the hopes of a new generation seeking to disentangle the country from the political straitjacket that has paralyzed past leaders Although Macron represents the reformist establishment he was the principal disrupter of the campaign The question now hanging over France is whether Macron can set the country on a path of stronger and more focused leadership capable of confronting the manifold challenges that it faces both at home and abroad Macron faces a big challenge in the parliamentary elections in June party may be too new to win a majority of seats in the National Assembly It says it will fight in all 577 constituencies but sitting representatives of mainstream parties have deep local roots The most likely outcome is a coalition and a working arrangement with the Republicans They would not oppose Macron’s initial reform program aimed at liberalizing the labor market and making France more competitive while reducing the high unemployment rate the new president may enjoy a brief post-election honeymoon but the forces of the National Front on the right and the hard left powered by the trade union General Confederation of Labor will be gunning for him with street demonstrations and a drumbeat of opposition He could set the Fifth Republic on a new and more positive course but he has deep waters to navigate to set right the decline in leadership under his predecessors Cécile Alduy Matthias Matthijs and Mark Blyth * Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply to your newsletter subscription. A comfortable, efficient cabin, five inches wider than 787 Over 70 percent of the A350 XWB’s weight-efficient airframe is made from advanced materials combining composites (53 %), titanium and advanced aluminium alloys. The aircraft’s innovative all-new Carbon Fibre Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) fuselage results in lower fuel burn (25 %better fuel efficiency) as well as easier maintenance. Thales, an Airbus strong partner onboard A350 XWB Thales is selected in 2008 to design and deliver avionics solutions for this new long range aircraft: This program is managed in Toulouse for avionics perimeter and involves all other French Thales Avionics entities: Meudon, Châtellerault, Bordeaux-Le Haillan, Vendôme et Valence. With the advent of the A380 and now the A350 XWB, the main sea-change in the cockpit has been the shift to large display screens. Thales fits A380 cockpits with ten main screens, eight of which deal with avionics-related information, the remaining two being On-board Information System (OIS) displays, covering outside and open information relating to weather, traffic, etc. The A350 XWB boasts an integrated system bringing together so-called “open world” and “closed world” (secure avionics) information, enabling the optimized management of information to allow the pilots to work efficiently together. For instance, they can bring information from the lateral screens to the central ones to allow them to work together on a particular piece of information. With the new A350 XWB, if one of the screens fails, the cockpit displays are automatically reconfigured to use the lateral displays. The new cockpit display system achieves simplified and streamlined interactivity with the entire system. Overall, the A350 XWB cockpit has been designed as a natural evolution of the A380 cockpit, with the aim of ensuring continuity throughout the range. An A380 pilot will need just minimal amounts of training to be able to transfer to the new layout and functions of the A350 XWB. Thales’s Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) solution represents a real-time airborne computer network system. This network consists of a number of computing modules capable of supporting numerous applications of differing criticality levels. The IMA is a major technical evolution of global importance for airlines and operators. Using new technologies, Thales has standardized and reduced by half the number of CPIOMs (Core Processing Inputs/Outputs Module) and CRDCs (Common Remote Data Concentrator) – both of which are the main building blocks of the IMA suite – meaning that the components are easier to maintain, repair and stock. The IMA represents a substantial leap along the path to standardization and simplification, and the whole aircraft is set to benefits. These new technologies will enable the airlines to use SESAR new procedures (example: 4D trajectories) as soon as they will be available. Thales’ HUD is already available on all aircraft within the Airbus Fly-By-Wire family. A single or dual configuration will be available as a customer option in the A350 XWB catalogue. New HUD provides a flexible platform for growth to support new features such as Enhanced Vision Systems (EVS) and potentially Surface Guidance System (SGS) and Synthetic Vision Systems (SVS), in addition to offering unique symbology entirely consistent with Airbus’ cockpit philosophy. *A head-up display is any transparent display that presents data without requiring users to look away from their usual viewpoints. The origin of the name stems from a pilot being able to view information with the head positioned "up" and looking forward, instead of angled down looking at lower instruments. Although they were initially developed for military aviation, HUDs are now used in commercial aircraft, automobiles, and other applications. You don't have permission to access the page you requested. What is this page?The website you are visiting is protected.For security reasons this page cannot be displayed. Previous teams: Omega Pharma-QuickStep (2009-2013); Cofidis (2005-2008); Bonjour/Brioches la Boulangère (2000-2004) A successful amateur, Sylvain Chavanel, soon came to the attention of directeur sportif Jean-René Bernardeau signing his first professional contract with the Bonjour squad in 2000. The latest race content, interviews, features, reviews and expert buying guides, direct to your inbox! Early victories came in 2002, with success at the Four Days of Dunkirk and the Trophée des Grimpeurs. Taking several wins throughout the early stages of his career, Chavanel was soon lauded as the next great French hope to replace the legacy left by the likes of Bernard Hinault and Laurent Fignon. Feeling the weight of expectation upon his young shoulders, his anxiety was oft reflected in his style of racing; his trademark style of attacking in the final kilometres of a race, where the peloton is at full gas, earned him plaudits and criticism alike. With the expectation, however, came an enormous pay packet as Chavanel moved the larger French team, Cofidis, for the 2005 season. For several years Chavanel was France’s main contender in the Tour de France, although it took several years of frustrating events in the race discover that his talents were to lie elsewhere. After drawing criticism from non other than Bernard Hinault, Chavanel restructured his training programme over the winter of 2007-2008 and returned a revitalised rider. Focusing on one-day races and shorter stage races, the Frenchman took the Dwars door Vlaanderen, Brabantse Pijl, the French national time trial title and stages in the Tour de France, Paris-Nice and the Tour of Catalonia. Chavanel signed for Quick Step in 2009 and had a strong spring campaign, finishing third in Paris-Nice, fifth in E3 Prijs Vlaanderen, eighth at the Paris–Roubaix and ninth at February's Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne. The Frenchman won two Tour de France stages in 2010, and wore the maillot jaune for two days. In 2014, Chavanel signed for the Swiss IAM Cycling team. Tour du Poitou Charentes; stage four (ITT) Tour du Poitou-Charentes et de la Vienne; overall Tour du Poitou Charentes et de la Vienne; overall Tour du Poitou Charentes et de la Vienne; stage three Tour du Poitou Charentes et de la Vienne; stage four Click on the thumbnails of Sylvain Chavanel below to open a larger image in a new window. Thank you for reading 20 articles this month* Join now for unlimited access Enjoy your first month for just £1 / $1 / €1 *Read 5 free articles per month without a subscription Try first month for just £1 / $1 / €1 Cycling Weekly and its team of expert journalists brings cyclists in-depth reviews extensive coverage of both professional and domestic racing as well as fitness advice and 'brew a cuppa and put your feet up' features Cycling Weekly serves its audience across a range of platforms from good old-fashioned print to online journalism