Aiman Ezzat and Paul Hermelin discuss the past, present, and future of the Capgemini Group

Hello and a very warm welcome to all of you. My name is Louise Eklund and I'm absolutely thrilled to be here today at the head office of Capgemini with Paul Hermelin and Aiman Ezzat. We're going to be talking about the great performance and the progress that was made in 2019 and will be also looking ahead at why this is a singular moment in the history of Capgemini. Hello to both of you first of all, how are you? This is a really remarkable moment. Today marks the beginning of a new governance structure for the group. Mr. Hermelin, can you tell us a little bit more about that to start with?

I mean, I imagine that taking the role of CEO is a momentous moment after 20 years experience in the group. Is that right?

Yes, more than 20 years. Of course it's a very important moment in my career, in my life, as you can imagine. And first I'd like to thank the Board of Directors and of course Paul for the confidence they are putting in me in terms of leading the group in the over the coming years. Paul has marked more than half of the group's history and of course stepping behind him is a tremendous honor and also a big challenge, but I'm sure that as a chairman he will continue to support me and we continue to work together.

A little bit more complicated obviously. There's a lot of people around the world, businesses around the world have to deal with this crisis. How did you organize things at Capgemini?

The important thing was a very quick reactivity from the group. You know, from day one we have put in place a crisis cell involving all the functions and all our businesses across the world to be able to prepare for the crisis and to be able to deal with the evolution of the crisis. First and foremost, our priority was the safety and the health of our people, and we have dealt with that in a great way. And I'd like to thank everybody for ensuring that and having followed the group guidelines in terms of making sure that our people remain safe and healthy and moved to work from home. The second part, of course very important, was to ensure business continuity for our clients and to be able to maintain the level of service expected from them at all times, and we have been able to achieve that. And I'd like to thank all the talent and all the people in the group for their dedication to make that happen. But beyond that, we have also done a lot of contribution from a CSR front. Our teams have been involved in projects in a number of countries across the world with governments, with NGOs, with other companies to ensure that we are able to contribute to society in this very difficult period. And I'm very proud of what they have done.

I imagine that the crisis called for you to rethink the way you work. It's always strange to think that a period of anxiety has also allowed us to lay a foundation for new models. It's really a disruptive moment for digitization. So working from home, as Aiman just mentioned, but also if you think of online medical care, online retailing, so it's a period where we have learned, strangely enough, notably new models of people management. Because when people work from home, you need to support them, you need to be close to them with different models. And we have learned how to work through video conferences and all the new technology methods. I think this will probably help pushing the group a little further.

I'm sure the efforts that the teams have made around the world has been considerable. Yeah, a tremendous effort by the team. You know, first, as I see, people health and safety was the number one, but then the dedication in terms of what people have done to ensure client services has been tremendous. I mean, we had people configuring laptops, going and delivering them door-to-door for people who are confined to ensure that we are able to provide that level of service that our clients expect and to maintain basically their health and security. But beyond that, it was also how to try to maintain the business activity. You know, our teams continue to work with clients to help find solutions to continue to sell, to expand the level of business that we have, providing solutions and value to our clients. And it has been absolutely tremendous. And I'd like to again thank all the dedication and the people of the group for what they have done to ensure that Capgemini remains a great place.

Capgemini is also expanding. At the beginning of April, Altran became part of the group. What new prospects does this acquisition open up?

And I imagine a real accelerator for the group. Definitely it's a big operation, it's a 5 billion euro bet for the group, but it is well positioned. We have carefully thought about our strategy in terms of intelligent industry and how to expand the scope of the group in terms of what we can do for our clients, notably abroad, bringing that big convergence between information technology and operation and R&D and engineering to be able to create new opportunities. We are really stepping into a growth industry where there is a lot of demand from clients, and that is important because it's a strategic transformation for our clients around their operation. And with Altran, the group is very well armed to be able to take the leadership position around intelligent industry in the future. So for us, tremendous move with Paul to be able to take advantage of that and provide basically a new growth opportunity for the group.

Let's look ahead now. It's difficult to anticipate the future of course. Can you tell us the principles that will shape your efforts?

Are you feeling confident to face the challenges that 2020 will bring to us?

I'm feeling confident, after Paul's words. But really, the last few weeks have really revealed the strength of the group. The group has a very strong culture, very strong values since its foundation, and in a crisis this really shows up. And I'm very proud of what the teams have been doing, and I'm very confident in the talent of this group. This group is made of people, and these people are talented, and that may give me the confidence, in addition to a very strong leadership. So with people, with the leadership in the group, with the talent in the group, I'm very confident about the future and the fact that we can take Capgemini to new highs. Thank you very much to both of you. Thank you, thank you.

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