Newly appointed Thales SA Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jean-Bernard Levy has been on the job for the last two and a half months. He said he would be reviewing the focus of the largest European defense electronics company in order to find ways to increase profitability.
Before taking on the Thales position, he was the CEO of Vivendi and was chosen to lead the company after the ouster of former CEO Luc Vigneron led by primary shareholders Dassault Aviation SA and the French government. The move was supposedly to boost the company's financial performance as the aerospace industry is moving away from military design to more commercial designs such as Boeing Co and Airbus SAS.
He said "We are in the process of a significant period of introspection about where we should go in the next few years. When you look at aerospace companies, we are still the poor guy in the room." He said that along with company restructuring, cost cutting plans would be implemented, especially the one instituted by the former CEO before his departure.
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