The Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire gives his preference to the appointment of a woman at the head of Orange, following hearing three candidates “with interesting profiles” including a woman, Christel Heydemann, said Bercy on Wednesday.
“With equal skills, the minister wants a woman to take over the management of Orange,” said this source to the ministry. The latter specifies that if the State is a reference shareholder of Orange, “there is a recruitment process and a board of directors which ultimately decides”.
Last November, Orange boss Stéphane Richard was sentenced to one year suspended prison sentence and a 50,000 euro fine in the Crédit Lyonnais arbitration case in favor of Bernard Tapie. He was found guilty of complicity in the embezzlement of public funds, but acquitted for the facts of complicity in fraud, the court considering that he did not know that the arbitration was fraudulent.
Stéphane Richard’s resignation effective January 31
The man who headed the French telecommunications giant for eleven years then resigned from the company’s board of directors. The board of directors has decided that Stéphane Richard’s resignation will be effective no later than January 31, 2022, time to put in place a new governance.
His possible successor is therefore the boss of Schneider Europe, Christel Heydemann. Engineer, polytechnic, with both operational and international experience. Also a director of Orange for three years, she is far from being foreign to the company and to the world of telecoms.
Two other profiles have been selected by Orange to succeed Stéphane Richard: the group’s deputy managing director, Ramon Fernandez, the sales manager of the American operator Verizon, Frank Boulbe. But “the minister wants more women to access governance positions in large companies,” said the ministry, while only one woman currently heads a CAC40 company in France, the general manager of Engie Catherine McGregor. From July 1, Estelle Brachlianoff will become CEO of Veolia.