EU: SME Conference

The European Commission hosted a conference on 7/9 April in Bonn, part of a project launched by the G7 Ministerial Conference on the Global Information Society in February 1995 in Brussels. The Bonn conference was held to discuss the development of a global business information network and electronic commerce for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Mario Monti, Internal Market Commissioner, argued at the conference that the “cyber economy” must be brought within the framework of the single market and announced plans to introduce a proposal for legislation shortly. Globally, he argued that the principle of mutual recognition of national rules on the regulation of electronic commerce should suffice for regulating electronic exchange across borders. In his view, national legislation should balance the need to protect privacy and intellectual property rights with support to SMEs to fully benefit from the cyber economy.