London's mayor is to get an e-business adviser to promote e-commerce and hi-tech businesses in the capital.

Colin Jenkins is on secondment from Energis and will work alongside Mayor Ken Livinstone for the next six months.

He will try and help develop policies to boost e-business activity within London - no easy task seeing that the streets of the capital are not paved in gold, but increasingly covered with the corpses of failed dotcoms.

He also plans to help tackle the IT skills shortage.

In a prepared statement, Jenkins said: "London is already a highly successful global hub for financial services and creative industries. By embracing and exploiting the latest business and communications technology, and fostering the development of a technically skilled workforce, London can remain a leading business centre.

"As a secondee to the Mayor's office I look forward to helping London enhance its reputation at the cutting edge of the new global economy," he said.

Let's hope Jenkins' is more successful than the British Government's own e-envoy, appointed to promote Britain's digital interests.

Alex Allan left the job in October 2000 after less than a year for "personal reasons".

A Government spokeswoman said a replacement for him would be announced "imminently". ®

Related Stories

British E-Envoy quits
E-envoy can't surf
E-envoy's home page has skeleton in closet