What struck French businessman Philippe Matiere most during a recent visit to Damascus was the many traffic jams - and he could sense the opportunity for his engagement with the recovering nation.

“There's a renewed sense of life,” said Mr Matiere, a specialist in rapid-deployment emergency steel bridges. When he visited the Syrian capital in 2023, the streets were nearly empty. This time, the energy was palpable.

Since the fall of the Assad regime last year, restrictions on car imports have been eased, triggering a surge in vehicles – and in foreign businessmen.

Last week, representatives of 42 French companies, including Mr Matiere, travelled to Damascus to meet President Ahmad Al Shara and senior Syrian officials.

“It was the biggest western visit, diplomacy included, in the past year,” said Souraya Karam, senior manager for the Near and Middle East for France's largest employer federation, MEDEF International, which organised the trip. “We haven't seen anything bigger.”

Now, Mr Matiere is hoping to win contracts to build 37 bridges across Syria, at an estimated value of €180 million. After 14 years of civil war, Syria will cost an estimated $400 billion to rebuild.

Yet the big sticking point is financing: the Syrian government is broke, struggling to move past sectarian resentment, and vulnerable to Israeli interference. “They need everything but have nothing,” Mr Matiere said.

Still, Mr Matiere is optimistic and has decades of experience working in the region, including in Iraq, as well as in African and Asian countries. He hopes to sign a first contract by the end of the year.

“Out of the 37 projects, a certain number will be funded either with Saudi funds, or a Saudi-French fund, or a bank, such as the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, which froze funds for Syria years ago that it never spent,” Mr Matiere told The National. “We'll find something.”

French positioning on Syria

France has been quick to establish strong ties with Mr Al Shara, who travelled to Paris in May to meet his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron in his first visit to a European capital since he took power.

Mr Macron has also repeatedly highlighted his country's refusal to re-engage with Mr Al Shara's historic enemy, former Syrian president Bashar Al Assad, despite increasing pressure in the past years to do so.

Paris lobbied hard for the EU to lift sanctions on Syria, which was done in May and was followed quickly by a similar move by the US.

Mr Matiere, who runs a family business based in Cantal, in the centre of France, was one of the few in the French business delegation to already be familiar with Syria. He had been approached by the previous government in 2023 after a devastating earthquake but the deal, which had Saudi funding, fell through after the October 7 attacks against Israel.

“All our contacts, and whatever their hierarchical level, said the same thing to us: come now to Syria, because everybody is coming, and soon we will get so many demands that we won't have time for you any more,” Mr Matiere said.

Major business delegations to visit Mr Al Shara in the past months included groups from Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

While he waits for the contracts to land, Mr Matiere plans to build a first bridge in the region of Idlib at his own costs. “The idea is to show what we can do for the client and the financier,” he said. “It also shows that we trust that we'll find a financing solution for the rest.”

The overall interests of the delegation was broad but a theme emerged around the recovery of Syria's basic infrastructure. “The idea was to understand what the reconstruction priorities are for Syrians,” Ms Karam said.

Challenges ahead

During the visit, the French group toured the Omayyad mosque, accompanied by three Syrian ministers – transport, finance and telecoms. Transport Minister Yaarub Bader, a former student at a prestigious French engineering school, impressed visitors with his fluent French.

What struck Mr Matiere was the difference in the formality of the meeting with Mr Al Shara compared to the more intense dialogue with the ministers, who engaged in a “ping pong” discussion. Many have experience abroad, including in western countries, which made in-depth talks easier.

“We were extremely well received,” said one participant. “We were accompanied the entire time by Talal Hilali, the head of the Syrian Investment Authority.”

Yet they also highlighted the need for the Syrian banking sector to fully reintegrate the banking system. The first Swift transaction between a Syrian bank and a foreign bank took place in June. “The banking system there needs to recover,” the participant said. “We expect the Ministry of Finance to announce a number of important reforms.”

The impact of decade-long US and EU sanctions, despite their recent end, is also still felt on the ground in Syria. The participant described it as “a machine that'll take a long time to pick up again”.