Francois Delille

Francois’ expertise in Finance is built on more than 35 years of experience in this function, including more than 25 as a CFO. He has brought numerous contributions to world-class multinational companies in many industries: IT/high-tech, paper, pharma, oil & gas and environmental services. As a business partner to his CEO and in cooperation with his management staff colleagues, he has been actively involved in creating value at all steps of the value chain: strategic marketing, R&D, manufacturing & supply chain, tactical marketing & sales, post-sales service & support; both for formulating strategy and for execution. With his teams, he has supported businesses during their growth phase (organic and external) and their restructuring phase (reorganization & transformation, business contraction, business split). His experience in M&A includes both strategy and integration. Francois has worked in France, Ireland, California, Switzerland, China and Hong Kong, and has travelled for business to more than 40 countries.

Professional background

As part of Veolia’s reorganization in 2013, Francois lead the finance transformation program to adapt the function to the new company structure world-wide. Prior to that role at the HQ, he was the CFO for Veolia’s water business in China, where he revamped business performance measurement to satisfy both the corporation’s reporting needs at the top and operational business management at the local level. From 2003 to 2010, Francois has held vice-president finance positions at CGG (leading provider of geophysical surveys primarily for the oil & gas sector), Sanofi (pharma) and ArjoWiggins (specialty paper), leading finance teams in multiple countries, introducing new performance measurement and implementing complex financial systems. Prior to that, Francois spent more than 20 years at Hewlett Packard in France, in California and in Switzerland. In the global CFO position for the world-wide personal computer business, he and his teams were key contributors to the business turn-around, multiplying revenue by 10 in 5 years. During his tenure as VP finance for Europe, Middle East and Africa, he lead or co-lead several major projects, including the HP-Agilent split, the HP-Compaq merger, the transition to the European single currency and the Y2K program.

Education and qualifications

François graduated from the ESCP Business School in Paris and from the INSEAD Advanced Management Programme (AMP). He is a certified MBTI practitioner.