NEW HEC PARIS CASE STUDY ON NEXANS: ORCHESTRATING SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS TRANSFORMATION

A TRANSFORMATION WITH MEASURABLE IMPACT

Nexans, headquartered in Paris, is the world’s second-largest cable manufacturer. Since 2018, the company has undertaken a sweeping transformation that redefined its strategic focus, organizational structure, and approach to performance management. At the heart of this change lies a simple but radical idea: doing more with less. Under CEO Christopher Guérin’s leadership, Nexans has pursued a deliberate shift from volume-based to value-based growth. The result? A doubling of margins, an increase in Return on Capital Employed (ROCE) from 9% to 21%, and a fivefold increase in free cash flow. EBITDA grew from €325 million in 2018 to €665 million in 2023 — all while reducing carbon emissions by nearly 40%.

This transformation was orchestrated using Nexans’ internal “Shift” methodology — a structured program for strategic and operational simplification. Shift enabled Nexans to cut its customer base from 17,000 to fewer than 4,000 and reduce product complexity by trimming SKUs by 30-40% per site. In parallel, the business structure was consolidated from 25 areas of activity to just four main units.

As CEO Guérin put it: “Sobriety drives greener growth. The key insight from our transformation is that sobriety, as a management philosophy, requires strong internal tools. When units struggled, the root causes were rarely external; they were predominantly managerial.”

A CASE THAT PUTS STUDENTS IN THE DRIVER’S SEAT

What makes this case particularly engaging for students is its immersive storyline and hands-on structure. Learners are invited to join a collaborative effort between Nexans’ internal “Shift” experts and the management at the company’s Mohammedia plant in Morocco — one of the pilot sites for the transformation methodology. Together, the team explores how to redesign operations for improved financial and environmental performance. Acting as members of the team, students grapple with the same questions Nexans managers faced: How should we steer business units that are underperforming financially and environmentally? Which segments should be discontinued, and which products deserve continued investment? Which initiatives from the sustainability roadmap should be prioritized?

The accompanying Excel-based simulation allows students to calculate product-level carbon footprints and build dashboards that integrate internal carbon pricing. Based on this analysis, they are asked to reshape the product portfolio: Which business segments should be prioritized, restructured, or discontinued? How do profitability and emissions trade-offs shift under different scenarios? Through this, students see how Nexans does not manage financial and environmental performance in isolation, but uses integrated dashboards and decision rules — such as carbon-adjusted margins — to align both. They then assess the viability of various CapEx and OpEx initiatives, such as installing rooftop solar panels or switching to recycled copper, and evaluate their impact on product-level emissions and financial returns. The experience culminates in a set of strategic reflections on how management control systems can be redesigned to support decarbonized, profitable growth — and how the third pillar of Nexans’ E3 model, engagement, fosters a culture of shared responsibility and continuous improvement, empowering employees to contribute actively to the company's sustainable transformation.

Through this journey, students thus discover that Shift is more than a toolbox — it is a cornerstone of Nexans’ broader E3 (Economic, Environmental, Engagement) management approach. By integrating financial performance, environmental impact, and employee engagement into one system, Nexans exemplifies what sustainable business transformation can look like in practice.

Sebastian Becker, Holder of the HEC Nexans Chair on Orchestrating sustainable business transformation

“Working with Nexans on this case has been an inspiring collaboration. We had the opportunity to bring real-world challenges into the classroom—around complexity, transformation, and sustainability—and to show students what it takes to lead change in a global industrial company. The feedback from participants has been overwhelmingly positive: they value the richness of the case, its strategic relevance, and the opportunity to apply management concepts in a very concrete and meaningful way.”

TEACHING A NEW LOGIC FOR GROWTH

The case was designed for both undergraduate and postgraduate teaching, and it can be flexibly adapted to fit different time formats and course types. It is well-suited to classes in management accounting, performance management, sustainability, and corporate strategy.

Among its key learning objectives:

1.  Understand the link between organizational complexity and performance — financially and environmentally.


2. Learn how reducing “bad” complexity (e.g., unprofitable customers, excessive SKUs) can unlock both margin expansion and emissions reduction.


3. Explore how product-level footprinting and internal carbon pricing can inform operational and investment decisions.


4. Reflect on how management accounting and control tools can be redesigned to guide strategic change in decentralized organizations.

Overall, the case invites learners to reflect on a question that is increasingly central to modern business education: Can companies be both lean and green? Nexans shows that the answer can be yes — but only with the right tools, data, and mindset.

A Word from Christopher Guérin, CEO of Nexans

“We are very proud of this case study! Nexans was in disarray in 2019, and in just a few years we have not only brilliantly turned around the company but also its reputation through an innovative approach like E3, now supported by HEC Paris. With the excellent work of the HEC Paris's team, we are now leaving a mark for students around the world, creating a new path for the businesses of tomorrow to be resonant, focus on the essential, and be regenerative. Companies must not only be efficient, but also readable and meaningful.”

Discover the case through Harvard Business School Publishing

More about the HEC Nexans Chair