Corporate Governance: Key Managers

The management team comprises ten top managers in charge of the Group's operational management: R&D, Sales and Marketing, Production and Purchasing, Finance, HR, etc. completed by the managers of the commercial drone subsidiaries.

 

The biographies of Parrot's key managers are presented below.

 

Additional information is available on the Annual report / reference document: information on the compensation of the executive officers and corporate officers (Chapter 15 - Compensation and Benefits) and the management chart and the bonus share / stock option allocation policy (Chapter 17 - Employees).

Henri SEYDOUX, Founder Chairman and CEO Parrot Group

Henri Seydoux founded Parrot in 1994 and has served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer since its creation. Self-educated, he began his career in 1978 as a trainee with “Journal Actuel”, where he was later employed as a journalist from 1979 to 1980. In 1981, he joined the sales team at the “Matin de Paris” newspaper. Then, in 1982, he joined SSCI as an operating system software developer, before working for Microarchi from 1983 to 1984 in the same role. In 1985, he set up BBS, a company intended to market the micro archi operating system. In 1986, he created BSCA, a synthetic 3D imaging company, and became its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer from 1986 to 1990. In 1991, with three other partners, he founded and became a director in the luxury goods company Christian Louboutin.

 


Elise TCHEN THEBAULT, SVP, Chief Industrial & Purchasing Officer Parrot Drones

Elise Tchen Thebault joined Parrot in 2000 to oversee product manufacturing and is currently SVP, Chief Industrial and Purchasing Officer. She has transformed this department into an industrial division capable of sustaining strong growth. Since September 2006, Elise has been heading up Parrot's asian based operations, previously in China and now in South Korea, and is also responsible of the Purchase department. She has developed an entity covering both the industrial section and component sourcing. This entity is enabling the Group to be as close as possible to suppliers in order to ensure effective control over quality and reduce the costs of the products manufactured. After graduating from ENSEM in Nancy, she began her career at Renault, first in the research division, and then in the cabling engineering research team.

 


Chris ROBERTS, SVP, Chief Revenue Officer

Chris Roberts joined Parrot in 2006, establishing the business & subsidiary in the UK as Managing Director, since then Chris has experienced multiple roles & businesses for Parrot around the world including VP Europe, CEO ANZ, VP JAPAC & from 2016 as Chief Sales & Marketing Officer, being a key architect and instrumental in Parrot’s “drone transition strategy” to commercial & professional markets. Chris is currently SVP, Chief Revenue Officer with responsibility for the global Parrot Drones business operations. Chris is a globally experienced proven senior executive level leader, entrepreneur and business transformer with +30 years Hi-Tech experience across UAV, premium consumer electronics, telecoms & automotive sectors. Internationally seasoned with missions based in APAC, Europe, UK & the USA at an executive general management level in sales, marketing & operations. Chris founded and was CEO of a successful start-up company specialising in enterprise sales and technical solutions for automotive electronics & mobile communications. Chris graduated with a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Adelaide (Australia) with high performance in strategic management, global branding and business performance improvement.

 


Pierre-Elie FORT, SVP Chief People Officer

Pierre-Elie Fort is the Human Resources Director at Parrot Drone since January 2019, and currently SVP Chief People Officer. He holds a dual Master of Labor Law and Human Resources and began his career in 2006 as an HR Lawyer in a media and radio group. He then dedicated himself to recruitment as a Consultant within the specialised group Michael Page. With these achievements in two key areas of the HR function, he went on to hold various position as HR Manager, first in an event agency and then, at the end of 2010, at Acticall Sitel, a global leader in customer relations. Pierre Elie Fort joined the Parrot Group at the beginning of 2015 as Legal and Social Affairs Manager before taking on the role of HR Manager in 2017.

 


Olivier MAURY, Chief Financial Officer Parrot Group

Olivier Maury joined Parrot in November 2015 and was named CFO in 2017. He began his career in management control at Valeo before joining Pechiney as manager of the internal audit department. In 2004, he joined Imerys where he held the positions of head of finance for various BU, then head of strategy & business development for a branch of the group. Olivier Maury is a graduate of EBP-KEDGE Bordeaux and of the Fachhochschule Münster in Germany.

 


Ludovic FLORET, General Counsel Parrot Group

Ludovic Floret joined Parrot in December 2014. He completed a Master 2 degree in International Law in 1990 and began his career as a Corporate lawyer in major engineering groups. First in the nuclear sector at Framatome (Areva), then in water treatment at Degrémont (Suez Environnement), during which he participated in numerous projects in Asia and America. In 2003 he created the legal department of the company Souriau ( aeronautic equipment), where he participed in the international development (India, Morocco, USA) during two successive LBOs. He became legal director of Oberthur Technologies (smart card) in 2011. Ludovic has more than 25 years of experience in leading High-Tech players, with strong exerptise in contract negotiation, litigation, M & A, risk management and compliance. In addition to Legal Affairs, he manages the Group's insurance program.

 


Christoph STRECHA, CEO of Pix4D

Dr. Christoph Strecha is the CEO and founder of Pix4D, a global leading professional drone software company headquartered in Switzerland, with offices in the USA, Germany, Spain and China. After it first invested in 2013, Parrot today owns 95% of Pix4D.

Pix4D develops and markets software for production of survey grade 3D models, orthomosaics and analytics from images which can be used in a variety of industries. Pix4D's technology is focused on the professional processing of images aquired by any camera, it is adapted to all the leading drone equipment.

Christoph Strecha received a PhD from the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) in 2008, completing his thesis on multi-view stereo. His research interests include structure and motion techniques and city modeling. A prominent figure in his field, Christoph Strecha is still involved in the work of several Commissions of the International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing. He has authored numerous papers and in 2015 received the Carl Pulfrich Award for his work in computer vision and photogrammetry.

 


Andrey KLEYMENOV, Chief Commercial Officer Pix4D

Andrey Kleymenov joined Pix4D in September 2022. He holds a Master of Business Administration degree from IMD in Lausanne. Andrey started his career in 1995 and worked in various sectors including banking institutions, management consulting and industrial companies.  Before joining Pix4D Andrey held leadership roles in business development, marketing and sales management in Pentair, a global water technologies company, and launched several digital ventures in Switzerland.

 


Jeff MULLER, Entreprise Cloud Platform Director Pix4D

Jeff Muller is Director of the Enterprise Cloud Platform, responsible for the expansion of Pix4D's mobile and cloud-based photogrammetry product lines. Jeff Muller has over 20 years of entrepreneurial and management experience in sonar imaging, computer vision, and geospatial software applications. Prior to joining Pix4D in January 2019, he worked as a technical coordinator for the Human Brain Project, working to develop a European infrastructure for large-scale neuroscience research.