Ángel Escribano plans to resign this Wednesday afternoon as president of Indra. As advanced The reason and this newspaper has been able to confirm from knowledgeable sources, the company is preparing to hold an extraordinary council at five in the afternoon this Wednesday to discuss. It will be necessary to see under what conditions Escribano proposes his resignation, which could also include his departure from the council.
The president of Indra is currently in conflict with the main shareholder of the technology and defense company, the public Sociedad Estado de Participaciones Industriales (SEPI), which owns 28% of the capital and three seats on the board of directors. Just days ago, the conflict caused the failure of the absorption operation of his family company, Escribano Mechanical & Engineering (EM&E).
The integration fell on deaf ears after it was pointed out that the integration could not go forward without first resolving the conflict of interest that meant that the Notaries were on both the buying and selling sides. .
Knowledgeable sources point out that in the board of directors this Wednesday “anything can happen”, since not only would Escribano’s presidency be at stake, but there could also be the departure of the current CEO of Indra, José Vicente de los Mozos, who has distanced himself from the president in recent months. The current CEO even assured in February that the operation would already be done.
The still president of the company is also openly in conflict with Sapa, the third largest shareholder with 7.94% of the capital and a seat on the board. In his favor, Escribano has the support of Amber Capital, which has 5% of Indra and a seat on the board. Amber is, in turn, the largest shareholder of the Prisa group, publisher of EL PAÍS and CincoDías.
Until now, Ángel Escribano had resisted pressure from the Government to step aside from a company that is called to be the national defense champion that pulls the rest of the sector at the height of European rearmament. The manager was even summoned to the Moncloa Palace to convince him to resign, but he finally decided to continue shielded by the support he has from the shareholders, who do not forget that the company grew the most last year of the entire Ibex 35, with an increase of 184%.
In fact, last week, during the award ceremony for the Ibex 35 Executive of the year awarded by CincoDías, . In this sense, the stock markets have reacted poorly to the possible departure of the executive, with a collapse of 6.4% in the middle of the session, compared to the rise of almost 3% that it was experiencing before the news was known. The decline later eased to around 1%.
The ordinary board of directors held last week, in the midst of tensions between the family and the Government, did not discuss the continuity of either the president or the CEO, something that will happen this Wednesday. If the departure of Escribano, who took office in January 2025, is confirmed, the company will have to look for a new leader who will help it meet the objectives of its strategic plan until 2030. Despite everything, the objective of billing 10,000 million at the end of the decade will be brought forward to 2028. Last year, Indra increased its profit by 57%, to 436 million, while the net contracting of new orders rose by 138.6%, to 12,778 million euros.
Among the candidates who have been heard in recent weeks in the pools to replace Ángel Escribano are , former president of Renfe and former secretary general of Industry and SMEs between 2018 and 2022; until May of last year; and De Los Mozos himself, in what would be a kind of temporary presidency, although the fact that he is a man closer to the PP than to the PSOE plays against him.
