Indra’s board of directors will meet this Monday to decide the dismissal of Fernando Abril-Martorell as head of the company, Europa Press was informed by sources from the company’s highest governing body.
The Sociedad Estatal de Participaciones Industriales ( SEPI ), Indra’s main shareholder with 18% of the capital, has conveyed to the rest of the shareholders its desire to promote a change in the presidency and promote new leadership at the head of the company.
SEPI, which has two members on Indra’s board of directors, has communicated its decision on the occasion of the preparatory work for the general shareholders’ meeting, which the company has decided to postpone to June 30 so that there is room to undertake the replacement .
Council sources told Europa Press that the April-Martorell successor will not yet be proposed at Monday’s meeting, and it is expected that his identity will be known throughout the week.
The former Minister of Industry Miguel Sebastián Gascón and the former Socialist deputy Antonio Cuevas Delgado are the two proprietary directors that SEPI has on Indra’s board. In Indra’s shareholders, other companies with relevant percentages coexist with SEPI, such as Corporación Financiera Alba (9.9%) and Fidelity , which has 9.8%, or Norges Bank, the asset manager of Banco Santander or T Rowe Price Associates with percentages around 3%.
The immediate reaction of the markets to the April-Martorell cessation caused a 7.96% drop in the stock last Friday in which the company lost the 8 euros it had gained after surprising analysts with its results.
The change comes in full project preparation for European funds and after the company has announced an ambitious project to launch a constellation of 200 satellites for air traffic control together with Enaire , in a project supported by the Government. Likewise, Indra was studying operations for the acquisition of a company for its digital unit.
Abril-Martorell came to the presidency of Indra in 2015 to replace Javier Monzón . Previously, he was CFO and CEO of Telefónica between 2003-2005 and CEO of Credit Suisse Spain and Portugal (2006-2011) and CEO of Prisa (2011-2014).
His mandate has been characterized by a greater international impulse to the company’s work and also by a commitment to the provision of digital services, a field where Indra acquired Tecnocom or the cybersecurity firm SIA, and in which Minsait, the affiliate associated with this area.
The administration of Abril-Martorell, which has survived sign changes in the Government (from PP to PSOE) and various ministers of Finance and Defense, generated discomfort in the current Executive when, in the midst of a pandemic, he wanted to apply a labor restructuring to resize the force company work. After union protests, the group eased the adjustment and agreed to less drastic and temporary measures.
Among the projects that did not come to fruition during the April-Martorell administration at the helm of Indra is the attempted purchase of the aircraft engine manufacturer ITP Aero , which would have been transformative for the company.
Indra has consolidated the coordination of the Spanish part of the new European Union air combat system (FCAS), in which the Spanish industry will have the same weight as the French and the German, one of the manager’s great achievements.
The company declared net profits of 22 million between January and March, 255.3% more than in the same quarter of the previous year, thus improving all analysts’ expectations, since it also raised its margins to 6.9%. Likewise, at the end of March, Indra had the largest project portfolio in its history with 5,322 million euros in projects.
