Alain is an executive strategy director at Hill & Knowlton, the global strategic communications and public affairs leader. Since joining H&K in 2015, Alain has been heading the industry, energy and transport EU legislative and regulatory practices, and working on transversal issues such as public procurement, merger and state aid control, restructuring, trade defence, IP and para-diplomacy.
From 2008, Alain worked as Alstom’s Délégué Général for Europe, head of the Brussels’s office and SVP for European Affairs. He established the EU office, recruiting and managing a team of recognised professionals and positioning the group in Brussels as a visible and well-respected contributor to EU policy, dealing with issues such as: energy (infrastructure) and climate policy; (rail) transport; trade (FTA, WTO, GPA, market access, public procurement, IPR); competition policy (state aid and merger control cases); research and development; regional cohesion policy (positioning the group on large infrastructure projects and dealing with member states), DG market, public procurement, OLAF, infringement procedures etc.).
Between 2003 and 2008, Alain was the president and CEO of ALSTOM China in Beijing. As legal representative of the Group for PR China, he sat on the board of 18 Joint Ventures with Chinese partners. He was involved in multiple acquisitions, mergers and restructuring activities across the region. He is a “friend of China”.
He worked before in various Business Units of the Alstom and Cegelec groups focusing on power generation and power transmission and distribution projects. In these capacities, he was posted in Latin America, the USA and the Middle East.
In Brussels, Alain is the founder and previous chairman of the Associate members of the “Rail Forum Europe”, former president of the “Club des Grandes Entreprises” and vice-president of the European section of the French Trade Advisor Group (CCE).
Alain graduated from HEC (France) before obtaining an MBA from McGill University (Canada) and ESADE (Spain). He is fluent in French, English, and Spanish (notions of Portuguese and Mandarin).