Her appointment officially announced on January 28, 2022, the new CEO of the Orange group, Christel Heydemann, becomes the first woman to hold this position. She will take office on April 4, replacing Stéphane Richard, sentenced last November for complicity in the misuse of public funds in the Tapie-Crédit Lyonnais affair.
Member of the board of directors of Orange since 2017, Christel Heydemann Heydemann held the position of boss of Schneider Electric Europe before joining the French telecommunications giant. After starting her career at the Boston Consulting Group, an international strategy consulting firm, she spent more than ten years at the Finnish multinational Nokia as Vice President of Human Resources, before joining Schneider Electric in 2014. Since May 2018, she chairs Gimélec, a professional union that brings together companies in the French digital electronics industry. A graduate of the École polytechnique and the École Nationale des Ponts et Chaussées, Christel Heydemann joined the renowned consulting firm, the Boston Consulting Group, at the age of 23, before joining Alcatel two years later.
“As a group administrator for almost five years, I have been able to understand the technological challenges facing our company. I know the challenges are major, but it is also a huge honor to contribute to the development of one of the major players in the telecom industry,” she said after her appointment in a press release.
At 47, Christel Heydemann will have to support the transformation of the group as a priority, in particular the gradual replacement of the copper network by fiber, or the development of cybersecurity and financial activities, starting with Orange Bank. It should be noted that an intergenerational agreement was concluded at the end of 2021 to regulate the reduction in the workforce which will result in early departures, but also 8,000 recruitments by 2024.
Added to this is the thorny question of the management of the internal organization of Orange, with major departures, in particular that of Helmut Reisinger, the boss of Orange Business Services (OBS), the B to B subsidiary of the operator. He also whispers of the possible departure of Fabienne Dulac, CEO of Orange France, and Alioune Ndiaye, CEO of Orange Africa Middle East, according to the French press.
