France's new ambassador to the United States is in Atlanta to discuss ways of expanding trade and other ties that have already created 15,000 jobs in Georgia, most of them in the metro area, French officials say.
Francois Delattre
, who succeeded Pierre Vimont as ambassador in February, visited the Georgia Tech campus on Thursday. Friday,Delattre goes to the High Museum of Art to award the Legion of Honor to nine Americans from Georgia and other southern states who fought to liberate France from the Nazis, and he'll give a medal to High director Michael Shapiro for his work on the popular Louvre-Atlanta exhibition.
Tech was a destination because of its longstanding ties to the city of Metz in France. Last year, the institute marked the 20th anniversary of its Lorraine campus. The French campus has educated more than 2,500 students, and last year France pledged about $31 million for its expansion.
The new Lafayette Institute there will focus on nanofabrication of optoelectronics, which combines research in optics, materials, electronics and nanotechnology, said Yves Berthelot, president of the Lorraine campus. The facility will give French companies a place to test new products in what Berthelot said is a booming tech area that includes solar cells, cheap printed electronics and wireless biometric sensors.
"With the ecosystem that we're building over there, it's going to bring some companies, hopefully, to Georgia," Berthelot said.
Delattre and Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed on Thursday also discussed pending agreements to encourage international corporate growth around Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport and airports in Paris.
French corporations that already have Atlanta offices include media company Publicis, credit card reader manufacturer Ingenico and Merial, whose collars protect dogs from fleas.
"France has long been one of our top investing countries," said John Woodward, who directs the Metro Atlanta Chamber's efforts to recruit foreign employers. He placed the number of Georgians employed by the French at closer to 20,000.
It's a different story when it comes to trade though.
"France is not a particularly strong trading partner with Georgia," said Robert Moore, an associate dean of the Economics Department at Georgia State University.
The country ranked 18th as a destination for Georgia goods and services, accounting for 1.6 percent of the state's exports, Moore said. That means there is room for growth, he added.
The French may be thinking the same thing: France is already ranked seventh for countries exporting to Georgia, and is eyeing Atlanta as a gateway to the Southeast, said James Blair, an official with Georgia's Department of Economic Development.
The 70 million people spread across Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas and the rest of the South equal the population of France, Blair noted.
"The French are not blind," Blair said.
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