A new page for the former French tech flagship: the IT group Atos announced on Thursday December 19 the end of its financial restructuring plan, which notably enabled it to reduce its debt by 2.1 billion euros. At the end of a long series, the group had “an accelerated safeguard plan” validated by a commercial court on October 24, voted on at the beginning of September by creditors and shareholders, in order to avoid collapse and reduce a debt then estimated at some 5 billion euros.
The French state has kept a close eye on this process due to activities deemed strategic and sensitive by Atos (supercomputers used for nuclear deterrence, contracts with the French army, cybersecurity products). In a press release on Thursday, the group with 90,000 employees worldwide announced the end of this restructuring plan, which notably enabled it to reduce its gross debt by 2.1 billion euros by converting 2.9 billion euros into capital. billions of euros in financial debt.
Atos, which has suffered setbacks in recent years including the loss of the contract linking it to the International Olympic Committee, also indicates that it has obtained 1.6 billion euros in new privileged financing, as well as around 145 million euros in equity. . According to the press release, Atos was also able to repay 800 million euros of interim financing and claims to now have no “debt repayment deadline before the end of 2029”. The group, which presents itself as the European number one in the cloud, cybersecurity and supercomputers, ensures that it has “the resources and flexibility necessary to execute its medium-term strategy”.
The group’s stock market value crushed by difficulties
“The finalization of our financial restructuring plan ensures the sustainability of Atos’ activities in the best interest of our stakeholders, in particular our employees and our customers,” declared Philippe Salle, appointed chairman of the board of directors on October 15 , quoted in the press release. He will also take the operational reins of the company on February 1.
The group is also pleased to have seen its credit rating raised to B- (with a stable outlook) by the S&P agency and to be assessed B- (stable outlook) by its competitor Fitch.
Several steps now await Atos, whose stock market value has been crushed by its financial difficulties. Thursday morning, the company’s stock was worth 0.0032 euros on the Paris Stock Exchange, after the massive dilution linked to the issue of new shares as part of its rescue.
At the end of November, the group entered into exclusive negotiations with the French State with a view to selling it the strategic activities of its “Advanced Computing” branch, which include supercomputers used for nuclear deterrence. The operation, which was not mentioned in the press release on Thursday and also concerns servers participating in artificial intelligence activities, covers the entire branch, for a company value of between 500 and 625 million euros. , Atos then clarified.
According to the press release, the next annual general meeting of Atos shareholders will take place on January 31 to validate the accounts for the 2023 financial year and its results for the year 2024 will be published on March 5, 2025.