Strategy & growth
Set the course, then hold it. Diagnosis, priorities, 100-day plan, market access and international development.
- Growth plan and roadmap
- Export, partnerships, distribution
- Transformation and turnaround
Advisory · Growth · Mediation · Board
No summit is won on instinct. It is prepared.
Fifteen years as a chief executive, twenty as an entrepreneur and investor. I work alongside owner-managers of SMEs and mid-caps who need to clear a pass: accelerate growth, unlock a deadlocked situation, or put real governance in place. Across France and the Benelux.
15 yearsof full P&L leadership
110+ countriesof international development led
20 yearsof entrepreneurship and SME investment
France & BeneluxOffices in Brussels and Paris
The point of balance
Why “pH neutre”?
In chemistry, neutral pH is the precise point at which nothing corrodes anything else. Neither acid nor alkaline: the state where reactions settle and building becomes possible.
That is exactly what I look for in a company. Governance calm enough for decisions to be made. Shareholders aligned rather than entrenched. An executive team pulling in one direction. Growth that is not paid for by the people or by the planet.
They also happen to be my initials. And a conviction: durable performance comes from balance, not from a contest of strength.
What I do
Four ways of working together
Short, scoped assignments or long-term support. Always at the level of the chief executive and the shareholder — never from above.
Executive support
The role is a solitary one. I am the peer who challenges, listens, and owes nothing to the org chart.
- Sparring partner to the CEO
- First-100-days coaching
- Interim leadership
Mediation & deadlock
Shareholder conflict, family tension, a negotiation that has stalled: restore the conversation before the lawyers freeze everything.
- Shareholder and partner disputes
- Sensitive family successions
- Stalled partnerships and negotiations
Board & governance
An outside view that carries real accountability. Non-executive mandates, strategy committees, advisory boards.
- Independent board member
- Family-business strategy committee
- Governance design and rhythm
Method
The climb as a working method
I have been trekking and climbing for a long time. The mountain teaches one simple thing: a summit is won neither by strength nor by enthusiasm, but by preparation, pace, and an honest reading of the weather. A company is the same expedition.
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Read the ground
Two to four weeks to understand what is really there: numbers, market, team, shareholders, and the things nobody says out loud.
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Set the route
A clear direction, three or four priorities, and the trade-offs owned openly. A strategy that fits on one page is a strategy that gets executed.
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Rope up the team
Nobody reaches a summit alone. Align the executive team, the shareholders and the board before departure — not at the first difficult pitch.
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Hold the pace
A 100-day plan, the indicators that actually matter, and checkpoints. I stay until the pace is steady, then I step back.
Track record
A practitioner, not a theorist
I have run a pharmaceutical group present in more than 110 countries. I have been the majority shareholder and operator of a Belgian natural-cosmetics SME. I spent eight years investing in family-owned businesses, running due diligence and sitting on their boards.
In other words: I have carried the P&L, signed the payroll, negotiated with the banks, closed sites and opened markets. When I advise a chief executive, I speak from that seat — not from a slide.
As a board member of COSMEBIO, France’s organic and ecological cosmetics federation, I also hold this view: sustainability is not a moral supplement, it is a management discipline.
Field notes
What I am seeing right now
Succession, governance, shareholder conflict, sustainability: notes from the ground on what actually occupies business owners.
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CSRD After Omnibus: Why Exempt SMEs Are Still Being Asked
Omnibus took the vast majority of companies out of mandatory sustainability reporting. It did not remove the demand. It moved it to the buyers.
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Business Succession: Why Three Years Is the Real Minimum
370,000 French businesses to hand over by 2030, around 26,000 deals a year. The gap is not a market problem. It is a preparation problem.
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Shareholder Conflict: What Eighteen Months of Silence Really Costs
A shareholder dispute is measured not in legal fees but in decisions never taken. Why mediation almost always arrives too late, and how to start in time.
Read
Let’s talk
Every summit starts with a conversation
Tell me where you stand and what you are trying to reach. I answer personally, within two working days, and the first exchange costs nothing.