Blog: After my trip to US: Strenghening the transatlantic relationship in digital area - Hoofdinhoud

Last week I visited again the United States of America [ from 7 to 11 October ]. I engaged with stakeholders in Seattle and New York City, after a brief visit to the nation's capital to touch base with World Bank senior officials to discuss the Bank's plans to increasingly use ICTs as an economic engine for developing countries, and with my colleagues at the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The Deputy Secretary of Commerce, Bruce Andrews, and I share the same analysis when it comes to digital technologies: they are an incredible opportunity to grow our economies, create jobs and address the societal challenges we face. But we cannot be blind to how automation, digitization and globalization of value chains will create massive changes in our labor force. Some of these changes will be painful.

Protectionism and nationalism are not the answer. We need to support innovators and job creators, even when that's at the expenses of "traditional industries"; but we must also put these industries in a position to negotiate with the newcomers and create win-win situations for everyone. I reached similar conclusions with many members of the Computer & Communications Industry Association (CCIA) during a working breakfast.

We must "Europeanize" our digital approach through the Digital Single Market Strategy, but we also need to strengthen our transatlantic relationship to set an example for the whole world: open markets, liberal democracies, sustainable innovation are the best antidotes to the fears and concerns of our citizens.

We should identify common standards, rules, regulatory approaches which would benefit all our industries: in particular SMEs, who are keen to digitize their businesses, but cannot afford to devote resources to navigate very complex regulatory divergences between the EU and the U.S. We can do this via TTIP, for example in a "digital chapter", or in some other way. I am neutral on the instrument, as long as we achieve the result.

The importance of this transatlantic "coopetition" (cooperation + competition) became even more obvious when talking to Microsoft, Boeing and Amazon in Seattle. Data-driven innovation and online platforms, when they don't lock in users or engage in unfair competition, are a core component for industrial competitiveness, in particular of SMEs. Our entrepreneurs should not waste resources in building their own IT infrastructure and rather use cloud services, provided that the right safety, security and business confidentiality conditions are met.

We need to be pragmatic and future-oriented. I will always argue for a sustainable policy and regulatory approach which does not simply "disrupt" traditional industries (industries that are made up of real people, with real jobs and real families that depend on those incomes). But across the Atlantic we should stop looking at each other simply as competitors, and leverage our respective areas of expertise to create a true transatlantic value chain.