François Barrault (born 27 September 1960) is a French business executive in the digital industry. He is chairman of the IDATE Digiworld Institute, and chairs the annual Digiworld Summit which takes place in November in

Montpellier Montpellier (, , ; oc, Montpelhièr ) is a city in southern France near the Mediterranean Sea. One of the largest urban centres in the region of Occitania (administrative region), Occitania, Montpellier is the prefecture of the Departments of ...

Early life and education

Born in

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefectur ...

, France on 27 September 1960, Barrault holds a

Master of Science A Master of Science ( la, Magisterii Scientiae; abbreviated MS, M.S., MSc, M.Sc., SM, S.M., ScM or Sc.M.) is a master's degree in the field of science awarded by universities in many countries or a person holding such a degree. In contrast to ...

(D.E.A) in robotics and

artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech re ...

, and is graduate engineer from the Ecole Centrale de Nantes.

Career

First positions

Engineer by education, he started his career as a researcher in Optical Network at IBM Labs (Research Center of

La Gaude La Gaude (; oc, La Gauda) is a commune in the Alpes-Maritimes department in southeastern France. History To the south of the village, a restored Roman stele is close to the Aurelian Way, the Roman road that passed near the present cultural ...

), before being promoted in the sales organization. He held senior management positions at Computervision, and

Stratus Computer Stratus Technologies, Inc. is a major producer of fault tolerant computer servers and software. The company was founded in 1980 as Stratus Computer, Inc. in Natick, Massachusetts, and adopted its present name in 1999. The current CEO and preside ...

, who was acquired by

Ascend Communications Ascend Communications was an Alameda, California-based manufacturer of communications equipment that was later purchased by Lucent Technologies in 1999. Ascend Communications was founded in 1988 and taken public in 1994. Initial investors includ ...

, in 1998, where he became Senior Vice President International, until the company got acquired by Lucent Technologies, Inc. in 1999. As a president and CEO of Lucent Technologies EMEA from 1999 to 2002 he successfully managed the integration of 38 companies acquired by Lucent. Barrault was also co-founder and chairman of Astria, an e-commerce software supplier.

BT Global Services and International

In 2004 he was named CEO of BT Global Services and president of BT International, as well as a member of the BT Group Board and Operating Committee. He launched a bold programme of 160 acquisitions which help expanded the BT's services business, creating a world leader in Networked IT services. Barrault was also involved in global governance and sustainable development activities. He led the BT BetterWorld. During this period BT suffered a major profits warning from the division he was managing. In that period BT sponsored champion sailor Ellen MacArthur and her team.

Current positions

In September 2010, he was hired by NovaSparks in

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

as a director and strategic advisor. François Barrault is founder and chairman of FDB Partners, an investment holding in technology, digital, and cleantech. He sits on the board of directors of several businesses: eServGlobal, Alpha Networks, La Baule Privileges and NovaSparks. He acts also as special advisor to IJ Partners (family office), Tactem,

Mastek Mastek is an enterprise-level digital engineering and cloud transformation company with operations in 40 countries. Listed on the National Stock Exchange and Bombay Stock Exchange, the company provides digital transformation services and softw ...

, ACE Fund, Ariadne Capital,

The New York Forum The New York Forum is a New York-based organization, holding an annual meeting in New York City that brings together political and business leaders from around the world as well as journalists. The Forum was founded in 2010 by Moroccan businessman ...

, Studio Moderna and Recipco. He is chairman of the IDATE Digiworld Institute,IDATE Digiworld Institute
/ref> a European centre of market analysis and debate, specialized in the TMT industry markets. He chairs the annual Digiworld Summit which takes place every November in

(South of France).

References

External links

Idate Digiworld InstituteDigiworld Summit
* Sailingnetworks

{{DEFAULTSORT:Barrault, Francois 1960 births Living people French businesspeople British Telecom people