Leadership

Anne Dekeukelaere 
Owner and Managing Director

MBA from ICHEC Brussels Management School and ALM Master in Sustainability from Harvard University (HES).

Anne joined Holcim where she spent 12 years in different line and executive. During her career at Holcim she had the opportunity to get experience in all the main businesses and corporate activities of the Group. Her first assignment was Treasurer of the West European holding in Brussels, followed by Business Development Manager at Interbeton, by that time the largest Group Ready-mix Concrete subsidiary with annual sales of 3.5 million m3.

In 2002, she joined Holcim worldwide headquarters in Zurich (Switzerland) as Project Manager within the Corporate Strategic department. She was managing and coaching strategic and business plan projects for Holcim companies in several countries around the world.

She then joined the Senior Vice President for Middle East and North Africa as Business Developer, allowing her to acquire a sound knowledge of this region business culture.

Finally, she joined the Corporate Sustainable Development Department where she had the opportunity to work directly with the “inventor” of Alternative Fuels in the cement industry, thus acquiring an exceptional experience in the Alternative Fuels and Raw Materials (AFR).

In 2008, she decided to capitalize on her intensive experience from the cement industry and created Cementis. Since then Anne continued to accumulate experience of the industry focusing on sustainability issues like CO2 mitigation projects.

Laurent Grimmeissen
Partner

After graduating with an MBA from EM Strasbourg Business School, Laurent started his career as Managing Director of a ready-mix concrete company in the East of France.

Following the sale of his company to the Holcim group (then Holderbank), he joined the French subsidiary of Holcim where he participated in a large restructuring project led by Arthur Andersen. Afterwards, he was appointed to Corporate Finance at the world headquarters of Holcim in Switzerland.

During his career with Holcim, Laurent held several positions including Regional Controller, Special Projects, M&A, and Vice-President of Middle East and North Africa as part of the Chairman’s office.

After more than 25 years with Holcim, Laurent decided to become again his own entrepreneur and joined Anne Dekeukelaere to start Cementis. During his now 45 years spent in the cement industry, Laurent has visited over 60 countries worldwide and thereby establishing a solid industry knowledge as well as a strong network of cement and non-cement decision makers.

Jean-Pierre Degre
Partner

Jean Pierre is a Chemical and Geological Engineer. He accumulated more than 41 years’ experience within the Holcim Group. Over his 41 years with Holcim, he held various positions and functions. As Senior Vice-President and Head of the worldwide Alternative Fuels and Natural Resources Division he was in charge of the worldwide “Wastes to Resources” strategy for Holcim and implemented the Co-processing business in more than 40 countries.

Jean Pierre is the founder of the co-processing concept (use of waste as alternative fuel and raw material in the cement industry) and promoter of the UN / Basel Convention Guidelines on co-processing.

He was also Board Chairman for the world renown GIZ-Holcim strategic alliance (2003-2009) and introduced the “Co-processing” concept at the COP 9 Bali – June 2008 which initiated the UN/SBC Co-processing guidelines.
Apart from being an expert and delegate to the United Nations led Basel Convention (UN/) and to R&D & Environmental Division of the European Commission, his passion is the development of neutral CO2 cementitious binders production.

After retiring, jean-Pierre joined Cementis as partner.