Atos wants to restructure its debt, which exceeds 4.5 billion euros

Highly in debt, the IT group Atos presented the terms of its restructuring plan on Monday evening. He wants to restructure part of his debt into shares and make his creditors shareholders.

Atos’ priority is to reduce its debt. Because the digital and IT services company is crumbling under a wall of more than 4.5 billion euros of receivables, the vast majority of which it must refinance by the end of 2025. This is why Atos requested, in the financing plan that it presented on Monday April 8, to convert a large part of its debt into capital, into shares, which means that the creditors will become, in fact, shareholders. Atos also obtained from its banks that they provide it with new funds to run and manage its daily operations.

And meanwhile, other alternative rescue plans are being prepared. And the main one is worn by David Layani from Onepoint. His company knows Atos well, because it already holds 11% of the capital, it is the majority shareholder of Atos. And David Layani is not alone, we learned this weekend that the Butler Industrie fund is ready to help him. The arrival of this investment fund, created by Walter Butler, is good news for David Layani who will need a financier who will inject new money into Atos. Butler Industry is a well-known business recovery fund. He is used to restructuring, having worked, for example, in that of the maritime transport company SNCM, that of Flo, or even Virgin. David Layani plans to present his plan by the end of the month.

It is not excluded that the State will invest itself

The State is actively working on the file. There is no question, for Bercy, of letting Atos’ strategic activities go into anyone’s hands. Because Atos ensures the technological security of the Olympic Games, but also the supercomputers, which are used to simulate nuclear tests. And Atos also works for the army. Bercy is therefore looking for a solution and if there is no serious buyer, it is not excluded that the State will invest itself.

Moreover, the government is also looking for an industrialist. For a long time, he believed that Airbus was going to take over Atos’ most sensitive activities, but the aircraft manufacturer threw in the towel 15 days ago. From now on, the name of Dassault Aviation is mentioned. The group has interests, Atos is present in the design of the Gust, its flagship fighter plane. Other large French companies are strongly encouraged by Bercy to take an interest in the matter, such as Schneider Electric and Thales. But they are not necessarily interested in going alone. Unless, pushed by the Ministry of the Economy, all these French companies join together in a consortium, in which the Public Investment Bank (BPI) would also sit, to save the strategic activities of Atos.