Antoine Bernard de Saint-Affrique is a French businessman. He was appointed

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

of the

Danone Danone S.A. () is a French multinational corporation, multinational food-products corporation based in Paris. It was founded in Barcelona, Spain. It is listed on Euronext Paris where it is a component of the CAC 40 stock market index. Some of t ...

group in May 2021. His family name is ''Bernard de Saint-Affrique'', sometimes abbreviated to ''de Saint-Affrique'', and his given name is Antoine.

Family name origin

His ancestor Louis Bernard, born in

Valleraugue Valleraugue (; oc, Valarauga) is a former commune in the Gard department in southern France. On 1 January 2019, it was merged into the new commune Val-d'Aigoual.1771 and the son of a

protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

pastor A pastor (abbreviated as "Pr" or "Ptr" , or "Ps" ) is the leader of a Christian congregation who also gives advice and counsel to people from the community or congregation. In Lutheranism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and ...

, held positions in the military administration under the

First French Empire The First French Empire, officially the French Republic, then the French Empire (; Latin: ) after 1809, also known as Napoleonic France, was the empire ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte, who established French hegemony over much of continental Eu ...

: he was military intendant of the guard of the

Kingdom of Naples The Kingdom of Naples ( la, Regnum Neapolitanum; it, Regno di Napoli; nap, Regno 'e Napule), also known as the Kingdom of Sicily, was a state that ruled the part of the Italian Peninsula south of the Papal States between 1282 and 1816. It was ...

in 1806, and inspector of reviews in 1815. He was made

Baron of the Empire As Emperor of the French, Napoleon I created titles of nobility to institute a stable elite in the First French Empire, after the instability resulting from the French Revolution. Like many others, both before and since, Napoleon found that th ...

Joseph Bonaparte it, Giuseppe-Napoleone Buonaparte es, José Napoleón Bonaparte , house = Bonaparte , father = Carlo Buonaparte , mother = Letizia Ramolino , birth_date = 7 January 1768 , birth_place = Corte, Corsica, Republic of ...

, King of Naples, in 1807, and this title was confirmed under the Bourbon Restauration in 1819 and 1821. He was authorized in 1819 to "regularly join to his name that of "de Saint-Affrique".

Life

Youth

Antoine de Saint-Affrique was born in December 1964. He graduated from the

ESSEC The École Supérieure des Sciences Economiques et Commerciales (more commonly ESSEC Business School or ESSEC) is a major French business and management school, with non-profit association status (French association law of 1901) founded in 1907 ...

. In 1987-1988, he did his military service in the

French Navy The French Navy (french: Marine nationale, lit=National Navy), informally , is the maritime arm of the French Armed Forces and one of the five military service branches of France. It is among the largest and most powerful naval forces in t ...

, of which he became a

Reserve Officer A military reserve force is a military organization whose members have military and civilian occupations. They are not normally kept under arms, and their main role is to be available when their military requires additional manpower. Reserve f ...

Career

Most of his career was spent at

Unilever Unilever plc is a British multinational consumer goods company with headquarters in London, England. Unilever products include food, condiments, bottled water, baby food, soft drink, ice cream, instant coffee, cleaning agents, energy drink, t ...

, where he held various marketing positions from 1989 to 1997. One of his first assignments was to increase sales of Sanogyl and

Signal In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The ''IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing'' ...

toothpaste brands.Beatrice Parrino, "Danone : Antoine de Saint-Affrique prend les commandes" (Danone: Antoine de Saint-Affrique takes the helm"

Le Point, 16 May 2021 ''(in French)''(accessed 17 May 2021). He then spent three years at

, where he was marketing director of Liebig's Extract of Meat Company, Liebig Maille- Amora. Back at Unilever from 2000 to 2003, he was European Director of the sauces and condiments business, then from 2003 to 2005 the CEO of the Unilever subsidiary covering Hungary, Croatia and Slovenia. In 2005 he was appointed Vice President of the Unilever Group, member of the Executive Committee for Europe and responsible for all of the Group's activities in Eastern Europe. In 2009 he was appointed Executive Vice President of Unilever and in 2011 President of Unilever's food business. These various positions led him to reside in the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

and then in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, where Unilever's offices and headquarters are located. In 2015, he was appointed chairman and CEO of

Barry Callebaut Barry Callebaut is a Belgian-Swiss cocoa processor and chocolate manufacturer, with an average annual production of 2.3 million tonnes of cocoa & chocolate (fiscal year 2021/2022). It was created in 1996 through the merging of the Belgian ...

, Europe's leading

cocoa Cocoa may refer to: Chocolate * Chocolate * ''Theobroma cacao'', the cocoa tree * Cocoa bean, seed of ''Theobroma cacao'' * Chocolate liquor, or cocoa liquor, pure, liquid chocolate extracted from the cocoa bean, including both cocoa butter and ...

processor and chocolate manufacturer. During his tenure, the Swiss chocolate maker's share price almost doubled, a success he attributes to Barry Callebaut's strategy of

sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livi ...

. In May 2021, he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Danone Group, effective in September 2021.

Other responsibilities

Antoine Bernard de Saint-Affrique is an independent director of

Essilor Essilor International is a French-based international ophthalmic optics company that designs, manufactures and markets lenses to correct or protect eyesight. Its headquarters is in Charenton-le-Pont (near Paris), France. It is the world's larg ...

International. He is also a member of the Board of Directors of Burberry Group Plc and the ''Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce''.

Family

Antoine Bernard de Saint-Affrique is married and has four children.

Compensation

In 2021, as the CEO and member of the executive committee of Barry Callebaut AG, the total compensation of Antoine Bernard de Saint-Affrique was $7 million.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bernard de Saint-Affrique, Antoine 1964 births Living people ESSEC Business School alumni Chief operating officers French chief executives Groupe Danone people Unilever people