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EDF’s Pierre Gadonneix is planning New Constellation Energy Bid

By Amarendra Bhushan for CEOWORLD Magazine Updated:October 9, 2008

Pierre Gadonneix, who has a Doctorate in Business Economics from the Harvard Business School, is a graduate of the Ecole Polytechnique and of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure du Pétrole et des Moteurs, and has a degree in Economics is planning New Constellation Energy Bid. Electricite de France SA, the world’s biggest operator of nuclear reactors, may make a new takeover offer for Constellation Energy Group Inc. with potential partners including buyout firm KKR & Co.

“We are in talks with a number of industrial and financial partners, in particular KKR,..Among the partners, some are proposing a counter offer, but this isn’t the only scenario…I want a partnership in the U.S. and I won’t rule out any option,..I think in the U.S. you have to have an American partner. It’s not the law that says this, it’s my conviction…” Pierre Gadonneix said. EDF, which operates 58 reactors in France that generate 77 percent of the country’s power, is targeting four nations for nuclear energy investment.

Pierre Gadonneix
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of EDF

Pierre Gadonneix, who has a Doctorate in Business Economics from the Harvard Business School, is a graduate of the Ecole Polytechnique and of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure du Pétrole et des Moteurs, and has a degree in Economics.

An experienced businessman, Pierre Gadonneix has spent the major part of his career in industry.

Pierre Gadonneix, EDF’s Chairman and CEO since 15 September 2004, has steered and committed the Group, one of the leaders in the European Energy market, to an industrial plan for profitable growth, mainly in Europe. Under his impetus, EDF confirmed its financial recovery and in 2005 successfully took joint control of Edison, Italy’s second largest energy supply company before the Group’s expansion into the international energy markets in 2007 with the relaunch of nuclear power generation. EDF, a Public Limited Company which was quoted on the Paris stock exchange in November 2005, is a member of the CAC 40.

From 1996 to 2004, Pierre Gadonneix was Chairman and CEO of the Gaz de France group, after joining the company as CEO nine years earlier in 1987.

From 1978 to 1987, Pierre Gadonneix was Director of Metallurgical, Engineering and Electrical Industries at the Ministry of Industry, where he contributed to the restructuring of the French steel industry.

In 1976, Pierre Gadonneix was appointed as technical advisor to the Minister of Industry and Research.

Before that, he worked as Director of the Institut de Développement Industriel (IDI), the leading French investment trust specializing in SME’s. He joined the institute in 1972, as project manager, later becoming department manager.

In 1969, Pierre Gadonneix set up a computer service company, called SEFI, employing around fifty engineers. He managed the business for two years until its takeover by a major industrial group in 1972.

Pierre Gadonneix began his career in 1966 with the Elf Aquitaine Group, as an engineer in the Computing Department, and then at the Commercial Division of Aquitaine Organico.

Besides this, Pierre Gadonneix has other international responsibilities in the energy sector. In 2006, he was elected Chairman of the World Energy Council which brings together the principal players of this sector in the world. He has been the European Vice Chairman of this organisation since 2004. From 1993 to 1999, he also chaired the Conseil Français de l’Energie (French energy council).

Pierre Gadonneix is a member of the Conseil Economique et Social (Economic and Social Council). A member of the Board of the Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques (National Foundation of Political Science).

Pierre Gadonneix published a Doctoral Thesis at Harvard in 1975 under the title: “An attempt to meet the US challenge in the French computer industry”. He also taught Economics at the Ecole Polytechnique for 10 years (from 1983 to 1992). Pierre Gadonneix is a Commander in the National Order of the Legion of Honour and Commander in the National Order of Merit and in the Order of Arts and Letters. Born in New York on 10th January 1943, he is married with three children.

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