François HOULLIER, new CEO of IFREMER

Aged 59, a polytechnic and a doctor in forest biometrics, François Houllier began his career as a project manager in forest resource assessment at the IFN (National Forest Inventory) before becoming a professor at ENGREF and then director of the Institute Pondicherry (India) from 1994 to 1997. He then headed the joint research unit "Botany and bioinformatics of plant architecture" (CIRAD, CNRS, INRA, IRD and University Montpellier II ) until 2002 and held various management positions at INRA.

François Houllier takes over from Patrick Vincent, appointed interim CEO of IFREMER on 04 May 2018 following the departure of François Jacq.

Several major issues await it: the transfer of the institute's headquarters to Brest on 01 January 2019, the consolidation of the structure of the French oceanographic fleet, now attached to IFREMER or the finalization of the contract of objectives and performance that binds the institute to the state for the period 2019-2023.