Paris-based Thales looks like a plain-vanilla defense stock and trades like one. Its artificial-intelligence component sets it apart.
PARIS (Reuters) -French defence group Thales opened the door on Tuesday to buying part of the strategic assets of troubled IT company Atos while Czech businessman Daniel Kretinsky also prepares an offer, BFM Business reported. The government has made a provisional offer to acquire various strategically important assets from Atos, including its Advanced Computing, Mission-Critical Systems and Cyber Products divisions, and said it would also seek industrial partners. Thales, which is partially owned by the state, has repeatedly said it is not interested in the Atos computing assets known as Big Data & Security (BDS) because they do not fit its fast-expanding civil cybersecurity business.
Italy and France on Monday signed a letter of intent to create a joint industrial hub for ground defence involving companies from both countries, an Italian defence ministry statement said, looking to boost the European defence industry. The announcement came after a meeting in the Mediterranean island of Corsica between defence ministers Guido Crosetto and Sebastien Lecornu, who also discussed the situations in the Middle East and Ukraine. "It is crucial to bring together all the best European technologies and to make ever-stronger hubs, because we will need significant investment to keep up with technological evolution," Crosetto said.