Intelligence News

As intelligence services were particularly active in Africa during the Cold War, Maurice Botbol deemed it essential to understand their operations on a deeper level to develop a clearer picture of events unfolding on the African continent. Indigo Publications thus acquired the Paris-based French language publication, Le Monde du Renseignement, and its English counterpart, Intelligence Newsletter. This publication—which reported on developments in intelligence services in North America, Europe, the Middle East, Asia and the former Soviet Union—became Intelligence Online in 2001.

The Switch to Digital Publication

In the early 1990s, large-scale information databases were a rarity in Europe, although they were widely used in the United States. It was at this stage that Maurice Botbol contacted the recently-established Lexis-Nexis office in London and requested the integration of all of Indigo’s publications in both French and English onto a server. An agreement was reached in 1993, at which point Indigo’s archives dating back to 1 January 1992 were retroactively integrated. In the following years, similar agreements were reached with Factiva, CD-ROM SNI and L’Européenne de Données. This early digitalisation of Indigo’s archives allowed the company to launch its first website two years later, providing access to three years’ worth of archived articles.

First Website

In 1995, Indigo Publications became a pioneering figure in online news when it announced the “first website for strategic decision-making,” Intelligence Online. From its very first day online, Intelligence Online was made available for a fee. This went against conventional wisdom at the time but eventually proved to have been a judicious choice. The online subscription offer did not yet exist. Instead, individual articles could be purchased via an e-wallet system.

Exclusive Biographies

In an effort to diversify its activities, Indigo Publications launched a collection of biographical works under the title “Les hommes de pouvoir” (“Men in Power”). Each publication focused on a specific country in Africa, painting exclusive portraits of 100 of its key decision-makers.

Africa on the Web

In 1996, Indigo Publications launched Africa Intelligence. This online publication provided access to all the group’s publications covering the African continent and was the first of its kind to provide in-depth reporting on the region to a professional readership. Just as with Intelligence Online, launched the previous year, Africa Intelligence was made available for a fee.

Launch of the Magellan Project

As the internet developed, Indigo Publications found itself managing three separate databases that were each independent of one another: print subscribers; potential print subscribers; and online subscribers and potential subscribers. The most logical solution was to integrate these three systems, but there was no software on the market that met the company’s needs. Indigo Publications thus launched the Magellan project, with the aim of creating a single information system to incorporate all its data–be it editorial, marketing or accounting. Development of this project was entrusted to an IT services company and lasted for two years. From 2002 onwards, Indigo Publications took over the maintenance and development of this system by setting up its own internal IT service.

French Power Plays

In 2007, Indigo Publications bought La Lettre A from journalist-entrepreneur Jean-Michel Quatrepoint. This weekly publication, founded in 1978, was designed for a readership composed of high-level French decision-makers. To this day, it parses out the power struggles underway in France’s economic and political circles. When acquiring La Lettre A, Indigo also launched the LaLettreA.fr website.

Independent Press

Indigo Publications was one of the founding members of the Syndicat de la Presse Indépendante d’Information en Ligne (Spiil), which was set up in October 2009. Since then, Maurice Botbol has been president of the organisation, which is devoted to the development of online press.

The Discreet Intermediaries Behind Key Contrats

Adopting the same model as Africa Intelligence’s Insiders, in 2013, Intelligence Online launched its own Insiders Series devoted to the discreet intermediaries, often former political or business leaders, at the heart of negotiations on major international contracts. Among the first published were: Dominique de Villepin, Aaron Frenkel, Iskandar Safa, Dick Evans…

100% Digital

Following a long period of gestation, Indigo Publications went 100% digital in 2013. The print editions of Africa Intelligence and Intelligence Online ceased publication, and their corresponding websites were greatly enhanced and improved.

La Lettre A Goes Daily

After having been a weekly publication for 40 years, on 19 March 2018, the French publication La Lettre A became ‘the agenda-setting daily publication about power and influence’ in partnership with the specialised media newsletter PresseNews.

Published at 6:20 a.m. from Monday to Friday, the daily edition contained—and still contains—exclusive news and insights into the latest developments in the political, corporate and media landscape.

At this stage, La Lettre A , which remains in place today. Each Monday, the Enquête provides original insights on a specific topic; from Tuesday to Friday, the Evénement serves up revelations that go deeper than—and remain one step ahead of—the traditional media; each Friday, l’Entourage maps out the networks of power linking key figures; and finally, les Feuilletons consolidate all of the stories that the editorial team has chosen to follow in the long term on the website.

Fresh New Look for our Fully In-House Clients/Marketing Software

Originally created in 1999 to meet Indigo Publications’ specific needs, our back-office software, Magellan, received upgrades in 2020 that were two years in the making and greatly improved its functioning. This project, which our IT department managed from inception to rollout, gives our customer services and marketing teams an integrated CRM/ERP system able to better serve our commercial and marketing needs.

Africa Intelligence: The New Daily Publication Covering the African Continent

Africa Intelligence became the leading digital daily publication to offer coverage of the entirety of the African continent for a readership of professionals.

This new publication would go on to draw from nearly 40 years of experience chronicling the continent and the combined expertise of five confidential newsletters: West African Newsletter, The Indian Ocean Newsletter, Maghreb Confidential, Africa Energy Intelligence and Africa Mining Intelligence.

Remaining true to the editorial line of those five publications, Africa Intelligence would go on to provide its readers with a single publication containing 100% exclusive coverage of national policymaking across the African continent, as well as key regional and continent-wide developments. This publication is released every weekday at 5 a.m. GMT.

Inter-African economic, political and diplomatic relations—as well as security issues—have considerably grown in recent years. Emerging geopolitical powers like China, Turkey, Brazil, Russia and India have developed strategies to broaden their presence across the continent. It is for this reason that we believe a bi-monthly newsletter or one covering a single region or economic sector no longer fully reflects the current state of play.

The new daily publication covering the African continent, Africa Intelligence, aims to continue to cut through the noise to understand the innerworkings of power within each African state. The editorial team has grown and will continue its coverage of the oil and gas industry, as well as the mining industry. It will also cover new key economic sectors with a continent-wide impact: “Infrastructure and Power,” “Defence and Security,” “Banking and Finance”.

This new editorial format comes with a fresh commercial offering: a single subscription plan that provides access to all Africa Intelligence’s content. Preferential rates are applied based on the number of readers within a given institution.

Africa Intelligence‘s website itself has been entirely developed by Indigo Publication’s in-house IT team to provide a more intuitive and user-friendly browsing experience, whether viewed from a computer, tablet or mobile phone. Subscribers can also opt to use our “scroll through” edition, allowing the publication to be read as easily as a PDF.

Indigo Publications Turns 40

Paris, 8 November, Indigo Publications published its first professional newsletter, The Indian Ocean Newsletter (La Lettre de l’Océan indien), in French and English. This first issue marked the beginning of an adventure that continues to this day.

The founder of Indigo Publications, journalist Maurice Botbol, set out to produce exclusive and impartial information with high added value for a demanding international readership. To achieve this goal, he relied on capital owned solely by individuals and an advertising-free business model based exclusively on reader subscriptions.

Forty years on, the company’s founding values are as vital as ever to Indigo Publications, whose team continues to show a strong commitment to investigative journalism and economic and editorial independence each day.

Our philosophy is fully embraced by all Indigo Publications staff: journalists, editors, translators, sales staff, the marketing department, and IT developers.

Our solid collective commitment to our values has allowed us to stay the course, remaining true to our founding principles.

Our journey has not been without its obstacles—from the company’s creation itself to the ambitious development of our digital presence in the 2000s: Indigo Publications’ very first online publication, Intelligence Online, was created in 1995 and used an economic model that, in that era, was unheard of in the press and media landscape—yet we have stayed true to our collective vision.

In 2021, Indigo Publications had a team of more than 60 permanent staff and nearly 100 external collaborators, all of whom are encouraged to be independent, show initiative and lean into their creativity. Our company culture has fostered a swathe of cutting-edge developments within every department. Our publications Africa Intelligence, Intelligence Online and La Lettre A made the transition from weekly and bi-monthly publications to daily digital publications, reflecting our company’s forward-looking dynamic.

On our 40th anniversary, we would also like to thank all our readers, both old and new, for their trust. It is thanks to them that in 2021, Indigo Publications will have recorded its 19th consecutive year of growth and positive results.

In the coming years, our news teams and Indigo Publications’ other departments will continue to grow in order to offer our subscribers even more extensive coverage, while remaining, as ever, fiercely independent.

Intelligence Online Becomes a Daily Publication

Paris, 26 April 2021 – Intelligence Online, published in English and French, became the first digital daily publication wholly dedicated to intelligence.

Having been published twice a month since its creation in 1980, Intelligence Online began to offer its readers an entirely exclusive edition at 6 a.m. every day of the week. This accelerated publication schedule created the opportunity for regular, in-depth coverage of a global intelligence community that has grown considerably in recent years.

• At state level, the growing number of threats has profoundly changed the organisation, resources and priorities of intelligence services across the globe.
• When it comes to business intelligence, increasingly intense global economic competition has led to significant financial battles, driven by an ever-growing number of private investigation firms.

• And finally, cyber intelligence, with its new key players, has become a major and multifaceted challenge—just as pivotal for intelligence gathering as for major influence campaigns.

Striving for Excellence Daily

We believe daily publications offer the best way of understanding a constantly changing world—at both a global and local level—in which the boundaries between the public and private spheres have become increasingly porous.

Our daily publications continue to demonstrate our standards of excellence, providing our readers with original, high value-added investigative reporting and strategic information. We specialise in detecting the premonitory signs of upcoming shifts, anticipating the subjects that will be at the heart of tomorrow’s challenges.

A Growing Editorial Team

To achieve this goal, our Paris-based editorial team has been growing: specialist journalists have been recruited to examine the reasoning and actions of powerful figures in Europe, the Middle East, North America, Russia and China.

This reinforced team is tasked with untangling the complex web of networks that make up the intelligence community—its official operators and undercover intermediaries, as well as its private operators and tech-savvy figures. We aim to shine light on the global intelligence sector.

Smoother Navigation

Developed entirely by our in-house IT team, Intelligence Online‘s new website offers a more intuitive navigation and easier reading experience on mobile phones, tablets and computers. We also offer our subscribers an exclusive page-by-page browsing feature which allows them to read a complete web edition as easily as they would a PDF.

The New Indigo Website Goes Live

Paris, 24 February – After many weeks of work, we celebrated the launch of our new company website.

Simpler and more modern than its 2015 predecessor, our website’s goal is to offer a clear, comprehensive vision of our identity and the values that underpin how we think about our work.

This new website also presents our editorial line common to all of our publications–be it Africa Intelligence, Intelligence Online, La Lettre A or Glitz.paris–and acts as a launchpad for you to explore our different publications’ various websites.

Glitz.paris: The World’s First Investigative Media Dedicated to the Luxury Sector

Paris, 29 September.

During Paris Fashion Week 2022, Indigo Publications launched Glitz.paris, the world’s first investigative publication dedicated to covering the global luxury sector. Each edition is published weekly in French and English, includes zero advertisements and is available by subscription only. The publication has already benefited from a multi-million-euro investment, with the goal of breaking even in 2026. Though Glitz.paris will initially appear weekly, by the second year, the publication is projected to be released daily and backed by a team of more than a dozen journalists.

Why was Glitz.paris created?

Though the luxury industry is known for spectacle—with its lavish runway shows and iconic muses, its precious jewels, sumptuous hotels and extravagant boutiques—beyond the glitter and the glossy advertisements, an extremely powerful industry is operating discreetly behind the scenes. The top 100 international luxury groups account for a combined turnover of 300 billion dollars—a figure constantly on the rise.

Glitz.paris is designed for a professional audience. Each Thursday, it digs beneath the surface, uncovering the mysteries surrounding major luxury groups in Paris, Geneva, Milan, London and New York.

From the innerworkings of luxury houses, to the hunt for new talent and development strategies… from transfers of capital, to succession sagas and family offices: our editorial team has complete freedom when covering both the international luxury community’s minor scoops, and its major secrets.

A Team Dedicated to Investigative Journalism

Philippe Vasset—Glitz.paris‘s editor-in-chief—is an acclaimed investigative journalist and author.

An Indigo Publications veteran, Vasset spent eight years as head of Intelligence Online—a publication dedicated to coverage of intelligence services around the world—before managing coverage of the African continent’s networks of power at Africa Intelligence.

During its pre-launch in the summer of 2022, Glitz.paris published a number of investigative articles that enjoyed significant impact, particularly its investigation of the research centre that LVMH established at the elite French engineering school Ecole Polytechnique (click here for free access), as well as the insider scoop on how Chanel moved its head office to London and its asset holdings into tax havens tied to the British Crown (read here).

“Most of the publications covering luxury focus on the products and how they’re consumed. That’s not our approach. Glitz readers will be tapping into the major luxury houses’ strategies, tracking the progress of key industry players, and anticipating capital flows,” explains Indigo Publications CEO Quentin Botbol. “Glitz.paris remains true to what has been our mission for over 40 years at Indigo Publications: providing coverage of strategic sectors where information is hard to come by.”

An Independent Publisher

Glitz.paris is published in Paris by Indigo Publications, an independent press group founded by a team of journalists in 1981.

Indigo Publications operates in France and internationally, and produces three additional publications: Intelligence Online, Africa Intelligence, and La Lettre. Indigo Publications specialises in high-value-added information and is financed exclusively by reader subscriptions.

Indigo Publications’ turnover has grown between 16% and 18% annually and was projected. The company is comprised of 75 employees and nearly 130 freelancers.

Indigo Publications does not use advertising or do any consulting work. It is independent of any government or political organisation.

Financial Accounts 2021

For its 40th year in business, Indigo Publications recorded its 19th consecutive year of growth and positive results. This strong performance has been accompanied by an ambitious recruitment policy in all departments (editorial, commercial and IT).

Turnover reached €6.64m in 2021, representing 16% growth (it was also 16% in 2020), while operating expenses increased by 20% (13% in 2020). The expense-to-revenue ratio was therefore 82%. The operating profit reached €1.23m (€1.18m in 2020).

As of 31 March 2022, Indigo Publications had a full-time workforce of 67 people, including 45 editorial staff and 22 in other departments (sales, marketing, IT, management). Twenty of these positions were created during the last year. The company also has a growing network of more than 100 freelance correspondents around the world.

Our recruitment initiative has enabled us to produce more informative and higher quality publications, and to expand our editorial coverage.

Since 2009, Indigo Publications has been rewarding its employees for the company’s results through a profit-share plan. A payment of €258,000 was made for 2021. In addition to this plan, an employee shareholding programme has also been established.

Revenues and net profit 2006-2021 (in thousands of euros)

2021 profit and loss account

Indigo Withdraws from Content Aggregators

Paris, 4 May. After decades working with the main content aggregators in the news market (LexisNexis, Factiva and CEDROM-SNi), Indigo Publications withdrew from their databases in order to have exclusivity over the publication of its information and to have more direct contact with readers.

We believe that it is essential that our publications be read on our own websites. Indigo Publications is committed to producing daily editions—selected and structured hierarchically—the quality of which is reflected on our sites and in our daily email summary. In accordance with this commitment to our readers, we pledge to provide subscribers with key information, allowing them to consistently stay ahead of the curve.

In addition, our subscribers can enjoy a of exclusive services: daily newsletters, keyword notifications, weekly recaps, scroll-through editions, a “Read Later” option and much more.