Who is Bernard Fontana, chosen by the Élysée to become the future CEO of EDF?

Bernard Fontana , current CEO of Framatome, a nuclear equipment manufacturer and subsidiary of EDF, will be confirmed this Wednesday as head of EDF , a public company wholly owned by the French state, depending on the vote of parliamentarians, following his major speech to the Senate and then to the National Assembly.

He is to succeed Luc Rémont, who has just been dismissed after only two years. Too much tension with the industrialists. Too much friction with the state shareholder. Too much tension within EDF itself.

After a more political background, trained in ministerial offices, Bernard Fontana is a factory worker, a hands-on man. He must put oil in the cogs and juice in the cables.

Bernard Fontana is an industrialist. A graduate of the École Polytechnique and armaments engineer, he made his career working in factories: ArcelorMittal in steel, Holcim in cement, Aperam in stainless steel. Those who knew him speak of a discreet boss, not very good at communicating, but firm in his ways. Let's just say he's more about safety shoes than talking points.

He is "very attached to the connection between people and the company. During open days in our factories, we make sure that children can participate." So kids, this weekend, are we going to the factory or to Disney?

He is expected to restore relations with those known as "electro-intensive": factories, steel mills, paper mills, all those businesses that live on electricity. They were protesting against excessively high prices.

These companies were snubbing EDF. Michelin and Saint-Gobain, with whom they no longer got along. Under the previous leadership, some even spoke of a "fingered salute to French industry." We saw that the issue was also the reindustrialization of the country.

He was chosen to support the revival of nuclear power. Since 2015, Bernard Fontana has headed Framatome, EDF's nuclear subsidiary responsible for building reactors. He pulled the company out of the tank: an industrial, financial, and reputational crisis. He doubled the workforce and relaunched the factories. "He put people back into the workshops," they praise. "A hands-on man, a good listener, who knows where he wants to go," says a CFDT representative.

He knows the nuclear industry. A know-how that has become strategic again after a decade of uncertainty. France is once again betting on nuclear and turbine power to secure its electricity and move away from carbon-based energy.

Bernard Fontana arrives as France relaunches a construction program: six new EPR2 reactors. For a four-year term, the age limit for the EDF chairmanship is 68. Bernard Fontana is 64.