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Day: 14 September 2020

All-female team leads Cabinet

by: Cassandra Tanti
14/09/2020

The Cabinet of President Stéphane Valeri is now composed of a completely female team for the first time in National Council history.
Earlier this month, the National Council underwent several internal promotions. Sébastien Siccardi, former member of the president’s Cabinet, was given the duty of Secretary General of the Assembly, following the appointment of Philippe Mouly as Secretary General of the Judicial Services Department.
Stepping into his position as Legal Affairs Officer in the Cabinet is Camille Quilico-Borgia, former Head of Division at the National Council.
The restructure means that, for the first time in National Council history, the Cabinet is now an exclusively female team.
Virginie Cotta is Chief of Staff, while Elodie Kheng is in charge of Economic and Financial Affairs, Maryse Battaglia takes care of Social Affairs, Karine Marquet is in charge of International Affairs and Camille Quilico-Borgia steps in for Legal Affairs.
The various appointments took effect on 1st September 2020.
 
 

Prince: Digital is the turning point in Monaco’s history

by: Cassandra Tanti
14/09/2020

The Prince’s government is investing a further €15 million into Monaco’s Digital Transition, which includes everything from the country’s own Sovereign Cloud to digital IDs for citizens.
Digital technology formed a major part of the government’s economic recovery plan announced last week, but what exactly will the millions be used for and why is it so important for Monaco?
“Digital technology has become a strategic issue for all countries,” said Prince Albert as his government detailed the digital aspect of its €75 million recovery plan, implemented through the Extended Monaco program.
“The crisis has revealed glaring disparities: the most severely affected economies are those which have not been able to put in place the means and tools necessary to maintain solid relations between the State and its citizens…,” explained Prince Albert. “Today, more than ever, digital technology has become a strategic and critical issue for each country. This is why I am keen to expand its use within the Principality by allocating €15 million and helping my country to write a new page and become a model country in terms of digital technology.”
As announced in November 2019, Monaco will be the first European country to equip itself with its own Sovereign Cloud – the ‘Monaco Cloud’ – by 2021, a secure digital infrastructure that will support the Principality’s push to become modernised and at the cutting edge of new technologies.
Meanwhile, Monaco’s digital plan is being implemented by Extended Monaco, a 200-strong team led by Frédéric Genta.
“One year after the official launch of Extended Monaco, we are proud of the trust placed in us by H.S.H Prince Albert II,” said Interministerial Delegate in charge of the Principality’s Digital Transition Frédéric Genta. “This confidence stems from the convincing results that the Extended Monaco program has experienced during its first year of existence. The digital budget is proportionally one of the highest in Europe: nearly €400 per inhabitant. This is what will help us to equip our companies to be more competitive, to develop new investments, and finally to allow our citizens to be better trained and more equal in the face of digital technology.”
As detailed by the government, the digital part of Monaco’s economic recovery plan revolves around the following three axes:
1. Building a digital ecosystem that meets the highest standards, particularly in terms of accessibility to major international platforms.
By launching the Monaco Cloud in 2021, based on Amazon AWS technology, the Principality will be acquiring its own secure infrastructure. It means that data will be stored in the Principality, under Monegasque law and with a level of security validated and monitored by the Monegasque Digital Security Agency. The cloud will also meet environmental objectives. This Monaco Cloud will be operated as a new SAM, with 100% Monegasque shareholders, including the State as majority shareholder and Monaco Digital as industrial shareholder.
2. Training and supporting Monegasque companies and employees in their digital transformation through the Blue Fund.
The Blue Fund is dedicated to accelerating the transformation of the Monegasque economy and was initially endowed with €20 million. It will be implemented in January 2021 and will be jointly governed by the Department of Finance and the Economy and the Interministerial Delegation in charge of the Digital Transition. It will involve the financing of training, equipment and support for Monegasque companies; the development of local platforms such as e-commerce and payment systems; and finally, the creation of efficient and secure services on the Sovereign Cloud such as video conferencing.
3. Creating a digital economy in the Principality to forge new relationships with European investors on sustainable subjects.
Through its new STO (Security Token Offering) platform – a blockchain fundraising system – and in partnership with Euronext, the main stock exchange in the euro zone, the government aims to attract new companies, particularly digital, to Monaco to create around a hundred jobs every year and inject €150 million into the local economy.

From left to right: Isabelle Bonnal, Director of National Education, Youth and Sports; Pierre Dartout, Minister of State; HSH Prince Albert II; Frédéric Genta, Interministerial Delegate in charge of the Digital Transition; Jean Castellini, Minister of Finance and the Economy; Françoise Gamerdinger, Director of Cultural Affairs. © Communication Department – Manuel Vitali

Continuing on the digital path
The government also aims to continue to offer residents quality public services in the event of new social distancing or confinement measures, building on those established from the last lockdown. Focus will continue to be on:
Education, digitally enriching the teaching and learning of students:
Through the “digital college” project, the government will distribute 1,200 laptops to individual college students from November 2020. Meanwhile, the entire WI-FI infrastructure and computer network has been strengthened to support the new uses.
Making administration easier to access, available and responsive:
From summer 2021, each citizen will have a digital identity associated with their new ID or residency card. It will form the basis of the digital relationship between the Administration and the citizen and allow authentication that is both highly secure and simple, without the need for additional supporting documents.
And finally, all the administrative procedures that can be carried out online will be accessible via a single site in 2021.
 
Top photo © Communication Department – Manuel Vitali
 
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Monaco’s space pioneers welcomed at Palace

by: Stephanie Horsman
14/09/2020

It’s been a big month for Orbital Solutions Monaco. Just weeks after successfully launching their nano-satellite into space, Prince Albert II invited the team to join him at the Palace.
Monaco start-up Orbital Solutions Monaco (OSM), attended a meet-up with Prince Albert II at the Palace last week where managers and employees presented the Sovereign with a commemorative photo of the Principality’s first nano-satellite.
OSM, headed up by Francesco Bongiovanni out of offices in Fontvieille, only has a handful of workers but the highly skilled team has managed to build a reliable nano-satellite that is currently flying over the Earth at an altitude of 530 kilometres.
“The miniaturisation of high technologies offers small states and private companies the possibility to become full-fledged actors in the space field once reserved only for big nations,” noted the Palace in a statement.
A chance to enter this new chapter of the “Space Race” is appealing for Monaco as it is for other smaller nations such as Luxembourg, Singapore and New Zealand, who are building rockets, intelligence and research-gathering satellites or projects for future mining and explorations of the moon, asteroids and even Mars.
The satellite weighs in at a tiny 10 kilos and can do an entire revolution of the planet in just 90 minutes and a speed of 28,000 km/h. Despite zipping by, it collects and transmits climactic and atmospheric data in what is considered by scientists to be a “low orbit”.
After several delays due to a variety of circumstances such as the health crisis and bad weather, the satellite was finally launched earlier this month from a launch site in Guyana.
The company is not resting on their laurels, though. They are already working on other satellite projects and intend to build one with the assistance of local secondary school students.
 
Photo © G Luci/Prince’s Palace
 
 

ASM takes historic win

by: Stephanie Horsman
14/09/2020

AS Monaco secured their 1,000th Ligue 1 win on Sunday in a 2-1 home match against Nantes. 
Only three other clubs have surpassed 1,000 wins in the French Ligue 1 and now there is a fourth. AS Monaco joined the ranks with Marseilles (1,115), Bordeaux (1,057) and Saint-Etienne (1,044) with their win against Nantes on Sunday.
Team President Dmitry Rybolovlev looked on with pride as his team carried the victory. Sofiane Diop handed the Red and Whites an early lead which lasted until just after the hour mark when Nantes’s Ludovic Blas evened up the score. It was only a few minutes later, though, that Willem Geubbels knocked one between the posts, putting Monaco in the lead for the rest of the game.
The game also hit another milestone, this one more personal. Cesc Fabregas, the team’s 33-year-old midfielder, marked his 800th professional appearance and was celebrated by his teammates after the game who gave him a team shirt emblazoned with the number 800 on the back.
“800 games as a professional!! What an amazing victory from the team. Let’s keep it up!” Fabregas posted on his Instagram site.
Coach Niko Kovac, whose early record as new head coach sits at two wins and a draw, was complementary to the team, saying, “I want to say bravo to my team. It was a very difficult match for both teams. We had a lot of scoring opportunities, so I think the win is totally deserved. We created four or five big chances. I hope we can score a little more next time. But I think the fans enjoyed the way we played.”
 
 

MIPCOM announces digital only format for 2020

by: Stephanie Horsman
14/09/2020

MIPCOM is going with a 100% digital format in Cannes for the 36th annual international television content market event and has rechristened it, for the year, as MIPCOM Online +.
Due to the restrictions in place from the health crisis, MIPCOM’s organiser Reed Midem has announced that it has decided to replace its “physical gathering” with what they have dubbed MIPCOM Online +, a totally virtual version that is offering month-long access to things such as keynote speakers, screenings, conferences, intel, pitching opportunities and networking parties.
By using a “premium digital platform offering one-to-one video meetings and live chat among attending delegates”, MIPCOM Online + is planning to deliver an experience as close to the real deal as possible. The platform will roll out on 5th October and will be available until 17th November.
Their slogan, “The best of MIPCOM is just one click away”, demonstrates a real show-must-go-on spirit and a willingness to make alterations in the way they do business, in the hope that the heavy hitters of the TV world are just as flexible and willing to do the same.
“Our motivation has always been to bring together the global entertainment community around the flagship week of MIPCOM in order to support content discovery and new business deals, whether online or in person,” explains Laurine Garaude, Director of Reed MIDEM’s Television Division. “We made clear when we announced MIPCOM Rendezvous Cannes that we would only hold the physical market if conditions permitted. Due to the ongoing uncertainty around Covid-19 and recently increased travel restrictions, we believe that MIPCOM Online+ is the most effective way to move forward and to gather the global television community around MIPCOM Week.”
MIPCOM Online + will be centred around the virtual MIPCOM Week that runs from 12th to 16th October, though with additional features before and well after the event is over.