Biography

Professor, writer, special adviser to Francois Mitterand from 1981 to 1990, and founder and first president of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development 1991 to 1993, Jacques Attali is now chairman of A&A, an investment bank and private equity vehicle specializing in the development of European IT start-ups, from software to genomics.

He is also founder and president of PlaNet Finance, an international non-profit organization that uses the Internet to fight poverty, while focusing on structuring the microfinance sector.

In 1989, Attali launched an international action program against massive floods in Bangladesh. He is a man of action and reflection. An economic theorist with degrees from the elite French "grandes écoles," he has taught economics at several leading French universities.

His main work in economics and sociology has been on the main trends in human history and their use to forecast the future, in areas such as music, measure of time, medicine, property and other dimensions of human activities.

In 1984 Jacques Attali created “Eureka,” the main European program on new technologies, and in 1989 he launched an international action program against massive floods in Bangladesh.

He also founded PlaNet Finance in 1998, and is also currently Chairman of an investment bank and private equity vehicle specializing in the development of European IT start-ups, from software to genomics.

Jacques Attali then advised the Secretary General of the United Nations on the risks of nuclear proliferation. He is at the origin of the higher education reform, known as LMD, to bring all European degrees into line.

Jacques Attali is a brilliant and emotive speaker. A true “Renaissance Man,” he addresses a wide range of subjects, whether they be economic, political or philosophic.