Better still, a stockmarket flotation last year left Nexans with a debt-free balance sheet, a rarity among big companies in capital-intensive industries.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Nexans was doubly lucky that Alcatel chose to retain its fibre business.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Nexans operates with one-third fewer factories than it owned four years ago and has shed almost 6, 000 jobs, or roughly a quarter of its workforce.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Both Nexans and Pirelli have invested heavily in research and development.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Lyons remains an important site for Nexans, both for its new research centre and a highly flexible manufacturing plant that can produce more than 2, 500 different types of cable.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Nexans, for example, has more than 500 patents.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

Both Nexans and Pirelli also do research into fibre-optic technologies, the former to plug a gap caused by Alcatel's decision to keep its fibre business when it spun off its other cable operations to Nexans.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry

As a consequence, Nexans not only has limited exposure to the collapsed telecoms market, but also has a strong position in copper telecoms cables, a subject of renewed interest among telecoms companies keen to find new uses for traditional cables.

ECONOMIST: The Europeans stay ahead in a capital-intensive industry