2024-10-24 07:28:00
Philippe Salle had promised it several times: Emeria (formerly Foncia), the company he has managed for seven years, would be his last experience. At the age of 60 (he will turn 60 on 17 May 2025) and after a career as CEO led with his feet on the ground, from the oil services company Géoservices to the canteen specialist Elior, via the interim group Vedior and the engineer Altran, there was something reassuring in contemplating the end of his journey in stone. Yet he dove again.
Since 14 October he has been president of the Atos IT group and from 1 February 2025 he will also take on the role of CEO. “I didn’t want to leave Emeria. Atos presented itself like this. I am passionate about technology but above all I told myself that we had to save this group”explains Mr. Salle a World.
Atos represents the greatest challenge in the career of this engineer from Lyon, who preferred the Paris School of Mines rather than becoming a doctor like his father. Weakened by four years of strategic wandering, the IT group emerged exhausted from six months of financial restructuring. Its 92,000 employees worldwide, including around 10,000 in France, are worried about the future. Many of its customers have changed service providers. And its shareholders have lost everything: Atos shares are now worth only 71 euro cents while in January 2021 they exceeded 60 euros.
Too complicated, too risky
So far there is no guarantee that the debt relief plan drawn up by former creditors will allow the world’s tenth largest IT services company to be revived. Its revenue fell another 4.4% in the third quarter, it said Oct. 24, and its order book contracted again.
This situation made Atos unattractive. Many executives approached to become CEOs have declined. Too complicated, too risky. But for Mr. Salle it was the opportunity to take over the biggest company of his career, while on several occasions the doors of CAC 40 closed on him. In 2014, supported by Matignon, he was well positioned to direct EDF, but the Elysée preferred Jean-Bernard Lévy over him. Three years later, the management of Carrefour narrowly escaped him, beaten by Alexandre Bompard.
People who worked with him describe him as direct, efficient, sometimes dry, not very open towards others, but focused 100% on his mission. Karateka (black belt) and descendant of the general of the Campredon empire, Mr. Salle admits to running companies “at a gallop”. This will be even more true in Atos. “The financial situation requires us to act very quickly and launch a contingency plan at the end of this year to stem liquidity consumption. The strategic vision, then the implementation of the new organization, will arrive from March 2025″announces the future CEO.
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