Q3 2019

EU BUSINESS NEWS / Q3 2019 5 NEWS , Launched just eleven years ago in a suburb of Toulouse, the Bonici Pizza delivery company has evolved in ten years from just a few stores in the South-West to more than 44 purchase points across French territories. Already well established in the Nouvelle- Aquitaine and South-West, today they pursue an expansion of new franchise locations in 2019, in the Paris region, on Reunion Island, in Guadeloupe and Guyane. A first major franchise deal But the signing of their first major franchise deal, a few weeks ago, marks a turning point for this medium sized business of seven employees, by taking advantage of this to gradually establish itself in West Africa, before tackling the French-speaking markets of Africa and Europe. “Togo represents an anchor for us for future development in Africa. The West African market is actually one of the most important for us with a young, dynamic consumer population. In ten years it’s going to explode”, explains company founder Jerome Bonici. A development around the resource of service-stations A first shop will open in Lomé in 2020, followed by four others in Togo in the first year. For this development, Sodigaz have powerful leverage: the resource of service-stations, that they are presently constructing in Togo, but also across West Africa. When searching for the right restaurant partner for their service-stations, the Togolese company contacted Jerome Bonici in order to establish a strategy for diversification. Exporting the French model One doesn’t change a winning strategy. To export their business model to Africa, the commercial director and the head of training for Sodigaz have been selected from teams from Toulouse. “Franchise training was one of the key elements to our success in France. To stamp our mark on the African market, it remains a critical stage, even if the cultural context is different”, explains Jerome Bonici. ENCS, the European Network for Cyber Security, and E.DSO, the European Distribution System Operators’ Association have announced the launch of cyber-security baseline requirements for smart meters (SMs) and data concentrators (DCs). As the second in a series of security guidelines for smart grid components, these mark an important stimulus in improving and harmonising the security of smart grid devices across Europe, helping to build a more resilient “grid of grids”. The requirements provide European distribution network operators (DNOs) and distribu- tion system operators (DSOs) with a practical set of consider- ations that can be used totally or partially when procuring and testing SMs and DCs. ENCS has been active in smart meter security since it was es- tablished in 2012. Having started by analysing vulnerabilities in the smart metering protocols and effectiveness of certification approaches, ENCS publicly launched its first set of SM se- curity requirements for Oesterre- ichs Energy, guiding the whole of Austria towards a secure smart meter roll-out. Building on this approach for various countries across Europe, ENCS developed its unique requirements-based security testing method. Unlike tradition- al testing based on attempted tampering, the ENCS testing approach evaluates the actual security level of components against the requirements, and provides objective feedback to the manufacturers, helping them to improve the security level of the devices. Over four years of testing and improvement, ENCS has wit- nessed a considerable increase of the security level of the current generation of SMs and DCs. Bonici Signs a Major-Franchise Deal with Togolese Company Sodigaz ENCS and E.DSO provides one of the first sets of harmonised smart meter security requirements. With three million euros of turnover in 2018 and a growth of nearly 300% in three years, the French company “Bonici” is pursuing its expansion strategy to conquer new territories. Signing its first major franchise-group deal with the Togolese company Sodigaz it is making its mark on the Africanmarket. Nuno Medeiros, Chair of E.DSO Cyber-Security Task Force, stated: “Utilities can use the re- quirements as a baseline tool for risk mitigation, supporting their risk management strategies.” Integrating the expertise of key industry stakeholders, the new guidelines are already being applied by Austrian, Bulgarian, Czech, Dutch, Estonian, Portu- guese and Swedish DSOs for procurement and security testing purposes. Anjos Nijk, Managing Director of ENCS, stated: “With harmonisa- tion of smart meter requirements we have moved away from the scattered approach that saw disparate security requirements spring up across Europe.” “As more grid operators across Europe use this same require- ments set, it incentivises man- ufacturers to improve security. This then helps raise security standards across the industry. We aim to replicate this approach in other areas where the industry needs to structurally increase and harmonise security levels, such as in electric vehicle charg- ing and distribution automation”. Speaking on the development of security measures for smart grid devices, Joachim Schneider, Chairman of the Technology Committee of E.DSO comment- ed: “Traditionally, grid operators have looked to manufacturers to implement security measures in components, but manufacturers have waited for the operators to tell them what they needed rather than invest in the wrong technol- ogy. With these requirements, ENCS and E.DSO break the impasse, and we can all move for- ward as a more secure industry.” The new requirements build on ENCS and E.DSO’s recent leadership pledge on smart grid cyber security, and on their memorandum of understanding signed in 2016.