Éric Lombard

Éric Lombard, born May 16, 1958, in Boulogne-Billancourt, is a French business leader. Director of BNP Paribas Cardif from 2004 to 2013 then CEO of Generali France from 2013 to 2017, he has been CEO of the Caisse des dépôts et consignations since December 8, 2017.

Family life
Éric Roger Pierre Lombard is the son of Alfred Lombard, a senior executive, and Annie Lévy, a graphologist. Married, he is the father of three children.

He is the grandson of Pierre Lévy, an industrialist who founded the Devanlay group in Troyes. Pierre Lévy and his wife Denise collected more than 4,000 works of art, 2,000 of which were bequeathed to the city of Troyes in 1976, allowing the opening of the city's Musée d'art moderne in 1982. From 2004 to 2007, Éric Lombard was CEO of the Arts et Biens holding company, managing the family assets.

Education
Éric Lombard graduated from HEC Paris in 1981. After graduating, he joined Paribas Bank in the international affairs department and then in financial management.

Career in a ministerial office
In 1989, he became technical advisor to the government spokesperson in the office of Louis Le Pensec, then also Minister of Overseas Departments and Territories. In 1991, he was appointed advisor to Michel Sapin at the Ministry Delegate for Justice, then at the Ministry of Economy and Finance from 1992 to 1993.

Return to banking and move towards insurance
In 1993, he returned to Paribas, initially as head of mergers and acquisitions in the banking and insurance sectors. He also developed the department dedicated to financial institutions and specialized in investment banking. He continued his development after the merger with BNP in 2000, and in 2004 became CEO of BNP Paribas Assurance, the sole insurance subsidiary of BNP Paribas, a merger of Natio Vie for BNP and Cardif for Paribas. He became CEO in 2006.

Under his leadership, the insurance subsidiary — renamed BNP Paribas Cardif in 2011 — tripled in size and expanded widely internationally. Éric Lombard was awarded the title of Insurer of the Year in 2011 by the Club des Assureurs.

In October 2013, he left the management of BNP Paribas Cardif to become CEO of Generali France, succeeding Claude Tendil. He is also a member of the Generali Group Management Committee. In four years, he contributed to significantly turning around the French subsidiary of the Italian insurer (+31% operating profit over the period 2014–2016), of which he also became chairman in June 2015. From June 2016, he was also Chairman of Europ Assistance, a subsidiary of the Generali Group. In February 2017, he became Chairman of the EcoFin Committee of Insurance Europe, the European federation of insurers and reinsurers. He left his position as CEO of Generali France on June 1, 2017. Jean-Laurent Granier succeeded him.

Caisse des dépôts et consignations
On November 16, 2017, while Pierre-René Lemas had been acting as interim head of the institution since August 22, Éric Lombard was proposed by Emmanuel Macron to succeed him as head of the Caisse des dépôts et consignations, based on a project aimed at making the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations the financial institution for the common good. His appointment was subject to approval by the relevant committees of the National Assembly and the Senate. It was confirmed by a vote of the senators on November 28, 2017, and made official in the Council of Ministers on December 8. His first success was to bring together in a single structure the consulting and financing expertise of the Caisse des dépôts et consignations for territorial stakeholders under a single brand: Banque des Territoires. At the beginning of 2019, he began a merger project between the Caisse des dépôts group and the La Poste group, as well as a major reorganization in the banking and insurance sector with the merger of CNP Assurances and La Banque Postale, always with a view to acting for the regions.

Other commitments
A member of the Cercle des économistes, he was also treasurer of the Gracques, a French socio-liberal think tank, until 2017. In 2014, he was appointed director of the public investment bank Bpifrance, where he chairs the audit and risk committee, then became chairman of its board of directors in 2017.

He also maintains several commitments in Troyes, notably as a member of the Strategic Council of the ESC Troyes and sponsor of the 2013 class.

Publications

 * Au cœur de la finance utile. À quoi sert votre épargne ?, Éditions de l'Observatoire, 2022.

Award

 * Officer of the Legion of Honor (2023), knight (2013).