About

The approximately 70-strong legal department of Bpifrance is headed by an extremely well-qualified team of senior lawyers and departmental heads, overseen by group general counsel Boubakar Dione. Sophie Paquin is general counsel of the investment division branch, while Patricia Heinschild, Jacques-Olivier Sales, Marlène Amiel-Krel and Hélène Lemoine are heads of the business law and contract, governance, export law and legal operations and projects departments respectively. 2018 was a particularly active year for the team, with a number of achievements which have had a huge impact on Bpifrance’s activities. It has worked on the acquisitions of of Bpifrance Courtage, CDC-International Capital, Agence France Entrepreneur, Technology Transfer Accelerator Company, all major deals that provide a number of new strategic avenues for the company to follow going forward. In addition to the members of the legal management committee, group general counsel Dione wishes to mention the contribution of deputy general counsel of the investment branch Marie-Laetitia Vassort, who obtained an industry award related to M&A, a major recognition of the team’s efficacy in its deal-supporting. ‘Bpifrance’s legal team has the ambition to be in service of the strategy and the activity of Bpifrance that is in constant growth, in support of all the trades’, Dione continues, describing the team’s core culture: ‘It positions itself purposefully as a source of proposals and as a solutions provider, and beyond the common values of Bpifrance of optimism, proximity and simplicity we add rigour, pragmatism, willingness and independence’.