Fabrice Fries (born March 11, 1960) is a French business executive, currently Chairman and Chief executive officer of Agence France-Presse. He previously held various managerial positions in media companies such as

Vivendi Vivendi SE is a French mass media holding company headquartered in Paris. Widely known as the owner of Gameloft, Groupe Canal+, Havas, Editis, Prisma Media, Vivendi Village and Dailymotion, the company has activities in television, film, video ...

Havas Havas SA is a French multinational advertising and public relations company, headquartered in Paris, France. It operates in more than 100 countries and is one of the largest advertising and communications groups in the world. Havas consists of ...

and

Publicis Groupe Publicis Groupe is a French multinational advertising and public relations company. One of the oldest and largest marketing and communications companies in the world by revenue, it is headquartered in Paris. After 1945, the little-known Paris ...

Education

Fries studied at the Éco( in humanities),

Institut d'études politiques de Paris , motto_lang = fr , mottoeng = Roots of the Future , type = Public research university''Grande école'' , established = , founder = Émile Boutmy , accreditation ...

and

École nationale d'administration The École nationale d'administration (generally referred to as ENA, en, National School of Administration) was a French ''grande école'', created in 1945 by President Charles de Gaulle and principal author of the 1958 Constitution Michel Deb ...

(class "Denis-Diderot" of 1985). He also holds a masters degree in history from

Sorbonne University Sorbonne University (french: Sorbonne Université; la Sorbonne: 'the Sorbonne') is a public research university located in Paris, France. The institution's legacy reaches back to 1257 when Sorbonne College was established by Robert de Sor ...

Career

After graduating from the Ecole Nationale d'Administration, Fabrice Fries joined the French

Court of Auditors The European Court of Auditors (ECA; French: ''Cour des comptes européenne'') is one of the seven institutions of the European Union (EU). It was established in 1975 in Luxembourg in order to improve EU financial management. It has 27 members ( ...

, as an auditor, before moving to the private office of Jacques Delors, president of the European of Commission. In 1995, he became the special advisor to the Compagnie Générale des Eaux (now

) Chairman and CEO,

Jean-Marie Messier Jean-Marie Messier (born 13 December 1956) is a French businessman who was chairman and chief executive of the multinational media conglomerate Vivendi (formerly Vivendi Universal) until 2002. He is also frequently referred to by the nickname " ...

. In 1997, he was appointed Head of Strategy & Development of

, where he refocused of the group's activities on publishing and press. After Havas' take-over by Vivendi in 1998, it was renamed Vivendi Universial Publishing and Fabrice Fries became its Deputy General Director, in charge of the press and professional information divisions, working with brands such as L'Express, L'Expansion, Courrier international, Dalloz, Masson, Vidal, Le Moniteur, L'Usine nouvelle, L'Etudiant, Exposium, 01 Informatique, le Quotidien du Médecin, as well as several health information brands worldwide. In 2002, Fries was in charge of the sale of those assets by Vivendi to investment funds Cinven, Carlyle and Apax. In 2004, he joined Atos, an IT services company, as Group Senior Vice-President, in charge of key accounts and market strategy. In 2006, he was appointed General Secretary and member of the executive committee of Publicis Groupe, the third biggest communications group worldwide. In June 2009, he became head of Publicis Consultants, a Publicis Group agency specialising in corporate and crisis communications. On April 12th 2018, he became the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Agence France-Presse (AFP), one of the world's leading press agencies. Since taking the helm in 2018, Fries has contributed to AFP’s financial growth with a transformation plan that places a particular emphasis on the Agency’s video and photo services. Furthermore, AFP has continued to diversify its revenues under Fries’ leadership with its world-leadin
fact-checking service
which saw a dramatic increase in demand during the COVID-19 pandemic with the surge of disinformation surrounding the disease. He is a staunch advocate of

neighbouring rights In copyright law, related rights (or neighbouring rights) are the rights of a creative work not connected with the work's actual author. It is used in opposition to the term "authors' rights". ''Neighbouring rights'' is a more literal translation ...

for the press in the face of Google, which he deems a “just fight”, and even "a personal mission, because it is not normal that those that simply relay news profit from it."

Personal life

Fries is married to Fabrizia Benini, a senior European civil servant at the

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body ...

(DG CONNECT) and has two daughters. He is the brother of Charles Fries, a French diplomat, currently French ambassador to Turkey.

Publications

* ''L'emprise du faux'', Éditions de l'Observatoire, 2021. * ''Les Grands Débats européens'', Éditions du Seuil, 1995.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fries, Fabrice 1960 births Living people French chief executives