Xavier Niel

Xavier Niel , is leading of company French born the August 25th 1967. He is vice-president and director of the strategy of Iliad, group of French telecommunications, head office of the supplier of access Internet Free.

Biography

Cofounder of Iliad in 1991, of which he is majority shareholder (nearly 67% of the capital in 2006) and in addition author of a book of popularization on data processing, he began his professional path in 1984 by creating services from pink Minitel which made its fortune. He has Co-founded in February 1994 one of the first supplier of access to Internet in France, Worldnet, company resold in December 2000 with Kaptech (group Neuf Cegetel) for 40 million euros. He is at the origin of the products launched by the Iliad group, and in particular service 3617 Ass launched in 1996, societe.com, or the development in 1999 of the first offer of access to Internet (Free) having for economic model the transfers of France Telecom, until the creation of the Freebox. He is (with Rani Assaf) the precursor, in France, in the implementation of offers Triple play and of the concept of " Box". He is at the origin of the creation of the Fondation Free which he finances with height of 10 million euros with his personal funds. The objective of the Foundation is to provide to the French hearths: a phone line without subscription, emergency calls and calls towards the social services, an access to low Internet flow (email + access Internet), service of antenna with an access to the free channels of the TNT in numerical quality.

He was condemned on October 27th, 2006 for concealment of abuse of corporate asset going back to 2001 to 2004 in a company not having any relationship with Free or Iliad, and in which he was simple shareholder. He recognized the facts. The sum diverted over three years would border the 200.000 euros, according to its own declarations during a maintenance granted to the newspaper Le Monde.

Rewards

Le Figaro , in its edition of the September 6th 2006, devoted to him two pages for its obtaining the Grand Prix of the contractor organized by companies and magazines. The magazine “Challenges” classifies it in the “100 plus great men who make the world”, this same magazine classifies it with the 19th rank of largest fortunes of France (inheritance estimated at 2.741.000 000 €) (Source going back to October 2007).

See too

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