French system integration giant Capgemini names longtime deputy and current COO Aiman Ezzat successor to CEO Paul Hermelin, part of an internal managerial transition initiated back in 2017.
Ezzat takes the reins of the company on 20 May 2020, following the shareholders general meeting. The succession follows the previous decision to split the Capgemini governance structure by separating the roles of CEO and chairman. Thus, Hermelin remains chairman of the board while Ezzat takes responsibility for the general management of the company.
Ezzat has over 20 years of experience at Capgemini and has worked in many countries, including the UK and US. He was appointed COO of the financial services Global Business Unit (GBU) in November 2007 and became its global head in December 2008, a position he held until 2012. From December 2012 until 2018 he served as CFO, before becoming COO.
Before joining Capgemini Ezzat served as managing director of international operations at a "global business and technology company" from 2000 until 2004. This came after 10 years at Gemini Consulting, the former strategic and transformation consulting arm of the Capgemini Group, now Capgemini Invent.
The change in leadership comes 4 months after Capgemini announced the $4.1 billion acquisition of engineering and R&D services provider Altran. In April 2019 Capgemini suffered a breach compromising dozens of WiPro employees following the detection of suspicious activity on a "very limited number" of laptops and servers on 4-9 March. The malicious behaviour was similar to an attack faced by WiPro at around the same time.
