Didier Calmels

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Didier Calmels (born July 16, 1951 ) is a French lawyer and manager who mainly deals with the takeover and restructuring of insolvent companies. Calmels has also been involved in motor racing for decades, including at times in Formula 1 .

biography

Training and first job

Calmels studied law and economics in the 1970s . In 1974 he began his career as a lawyer. At first he worked for a law firm that worked at the Tribunal de Commerce (commercial court) in Paris , later he was an administrative lawyer (French: Syndic ) in the Paris suburb of Nanterre . In the 1980s he headed his own commercial law firm, Calmels Meille Harpillard & Associés . During this time he specialized in the takeover and restructuring of companies that were in financial difficulties. At the beginning of the 1980s Calmels belonged to the environment of the entrepreneur Bernard Tapie , whose legal advisor he was at times. Calmels gave Tapi access to high political officials, including the then Minister of Justice.

Homicide 1989

On February 28, 1989, Calmels killed his wife, with whom he had several children, and then tried unsuccessfully to take her own life. According to the court's later findings, it was an act of jealousy . Calmels was sentenced to six years' imprisonment in March 1990, but was released early in 1992.

D&P Participations

After his release from prison, Calmels founded the investment company D&P Participations (“Développement et Partenarait”, German: “Development and Partnership”) in Paris , of which he is still the majority owner 25 years later. In the following years he worked again as an investor and restructured economically ailing companies. Calmels came into the public eye in 2013 when he took over the Groupe Doux in Châteaulin , Brittany, via D&P , the largest poultry producer in Europe at the time, which had become insolvent the year before. At times, D&P held more than two thirds of the shares. In May 2015 Calmels gave up the majority stake again; he saw the restructuring of the company as complete. Calmels described his work at Group Doux as the largest restructuring project of his professional career.

Automobile sport

Co-financed by Didier Calmels: Alpine A460-Nissan from Signatech Alpine at the 2016 Le Mans 24-hour race

There are reports that Didier Calmels competed in amateur car racing in the 1970s. However, specific results are not recorded in relevant databases.

In 1986 Calmels entered into a partnership with the former racing driver Gérard Larrousse , who had been racing director of the Renault Formula 1 team until 1985 and after his retirement and a brief interlude in the Équipe Ligier organized the establishment of his own racing team. The contact was arranged by the racing driver Philippe Alliot , who was friends with Calmels and known to Larrousse. The team appeared in the years 1987 and 1988 as Larrousse Calmels in the Formula 1 world championship . Calmels was responsible for commercial issues here. After Calmels was arrested in March 1989, Gérard Larrousse took over his shares; the team was then given the name Equipe Larrousse.

After his release from prison, Calmels became involved as a shareholder in endurance sports. In 2008 he took part in the French team Signatech , which took part in the European Le Mans Series for a number of years and has also been competing in the FIA World Endurance Championship as Signatech-Alpine since 2013 as a partner of the sports car manufacturer Alpine . At the Le Mans 24-hour race in 2016 , the team with Gustavo Menezes , Nicolas Lapierre and Stéphane Richelmi achieved victory in the LMP2 class.

In September 2017 Calmels announced that in collaboration with Schmidt Peterson Motorsports under the name Calmels sports at the 500 mile race at Indianapolis participate. Tristan Gommendy was to be the driver . However, the engagement did not materialize.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Jacques Cordy: Calmels: 6 ans de reclusion pour le wonder Boy meutrier. www.lesoir.be, March 10, 1990, accessed October 27, 2017 .
  2. ↑ a b Entry on Didier Calmels on the website www.dp-finance.fr (accessed on October 27, 2017).
  3. ↑ Airy Routier: Le phénix: Le retour de Bernard Tapie , Grasset, 2008, ISBN 9782246703396 , p. 178.
  4. ↑ Keren Lentschner: chickens Doux: Didier Calmels part avec le "du sentiment travail accompli". www.lefigaro.fr, 19 May 2015, accessed on 27 October 2017 .
  5. ^ David Hodges: Racing Cars from A – Z after 1945 , Stuttgart 1993, ISBN 3-613-01477-7 , p. 141.
  6. ↑ The very detailed statistics on the website www.driverdb.com contain no entry on Didier Calmels.
  7. ↑ Didier Braillon, Leslie Thacker: Grand Prix in 1989 , Editions ACLA, Paris 1990, p. 9
  8. ↑ On Didier Calmels: Motorsport Aktuell, issue 11/1989, p. 7.
  9. ^ A b Romain Bernard, Thibault Villemont: Avec un Project 100% français: Calmel Sports à Indy 500 , AutoHebdo of September 13, 2017, p. 6 f.
personal data
SURNAME Calmels, Didier
BRIEF DESCRIPTION french businessman
DATE OF BIRTH July 16, 1951