FRENCH SMALL BUSINESS INFORMATION THROUGH THE INTERNET - A COMPARISONWITH US ORGANIZATIONS

Small business is taking a more and more impressive place in French em ployment. The south of France. and particularly the region of Marseill e. has been hit hard by the economic crisis: the heavy industry factor ies have closed one after another and the unemployment rate has increa sed to 25 per cent of the active population. The emergence of dynamic small or medium-sized enterprises and industries (SME/SMrs) seems to b e one of the solutions to creating business in this geographic area. T he concurrence between the different public local small business infor mation providers has created a complex situation in which strategic in formation is completely hidden. Of course the dissemination of small b usiness information is not simple and depends on the local characteris tics. The investments in the information superhighway are one of the P rovence-Alpes-Cote d'Azur region's characteristics. This article shows how the United States' administration has used the Internet to diffus e various types of small business information. This is followed by an explanation of the local problems of French small business resources. Finally, the first steps of a small firms help initiative is presented and some future developments are proposed in order to create a real s mall business help centre in Marseille. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Sc ience Ltd