At the end of his university career in 1975, Norbert Giaoui joined the Matra high technology group (now Lagardere), where he became General Counsel in the early 1990s.

As such, he had to know and take responsibility, at the legal level, of all the evolution (in particular, nationalization, privatization, transformation into a limited partnership with shares) of the holding company Lagardere, parent of the whole Group, listed on the Paris stock exchange.

He was also in charge of the legal aspects of all the major merger-acquisition transactions which shaped the contours of the Group. Those deals inlcude the acquisition of Hachette in 1980, the creation of Aerospatiale Matra in 1998 and the completion in 2000 of EADS (later Airbus Group) of which Lagardere remained one of the controlling shareholders until 2013. Lagardere then became a pure “Media player” through its two Book and Travel Retail divisions, each number 3 worldwide player in their respective industry with various legal issues at international level.

Norbert Giaoui left his position of General Counsel in 2014 before leaving the Lagardere Group permanently in 2018 to retire.

Norbert Giaoui is graduated from Sciences Po Paris, Economy-Finance major, and from University Paris 2 Assas, Business Law major.

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