The shock of transitions? Mathias Burghardt's perspective at the Rencontres Économiques
Market watch, Responsible finance
The shock of transitions? Mathias Burghardt's perspective at the Rencontres Économiques
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11 July 2025
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Private Equity
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Infrastructure
Reading time: 3 minutes
Mathias Burghardt
Executive Vice-President, CEO of Ardian France, Vice-Chairman of the Executive Committee and the Operations Committee
Mathias Burghardt is CEO of Ardian France, the Group's main regulated entity, which acts as AIFM for direct investment activities.
Mathias founded Ardian’s Infrastructure business over twenty years ago and has led it since its inception. Under his direction, the activity has become a leading global player, managing nearly $50 billion in assets across Europe and the Americas.
Committed to the transformation and decarbonization of portfolio companies, he has also launched dedicated investment platforms focused on low-carbon hydrogen and Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), aimed at accelerating industrial transition, fostering innovation, and contributing to the development of tomorrow’s economy.
He has led Ardian’s Technology and Innovation strategy since 2019, delivering several major achievements, including the creation of Ardian’s Data Science team, responsible for defining and deploying the firm’s Data and Artificial Intelligence strategy in support of Ardian’s performance and that of its portfolio companies. He also oversees the Brand & Communication function within the Company.
Today, he has developed extensive relationships with international industrial companies and financial sponsors, public authorities and regulators.
Vice-President of the Board of Directors of Nuova Argo Finanziara, the controlling holding company of the ASTM Group (the world's second-largest toll road operator), Mathias Burghardt has also been a board director of major infrastructure companies such as London Luton Airport, SANEF and the parking company INDIGO.
Mathias joined Ardian in 2007. He started his career in 1989 with Crédit Lyonnais in Media Telecom before heading HSBC Advisory and Project Financing in France.
Chairman of Ardian Foundation, Mathias Burghardt is also a member of the Board of Directors of the Alliance for Education - United Way, an organization with the mission is to promote equal opportunities and academic success for young people in priority education areas and rural zones.
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50%
of available capital in Europe is private savings
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400
speakers gathered in Aix to debate Europe’s economic future
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Third Aix presence
– 2025 marks Ardian’s third participation at Les Rencontres Économiques, reinforcing its commitment to European dialogue
Every July in the south of France, leaders from the worlds of business and politics gather for the forum Rencontres Économiques d’Aix-en-Provence for three days of debate on the economic challenges shaping the future.
A shock for Europe – but not the USA and China
A shock for Europe – but not the USA and China
This year's theme was shock in all its forms: geopolitical, technological, societal, environmental. 400 speakers from business, academia and government gathered to face up to the realities facing Europe.
The AI revolution is advancing at such a pace that it threatens to pull the world apart. This was one of the ideas that came up on the Saturday morning panel where Mathias Burghardt, Executive Vice-President of Ardian, spoke alongside CEOs and leaders from telecom, pharma, energy and mobility sectors. The panelists offered a sobering perspective on how the current moment is a shock for Europe – but not for the USA and China, who are surging ahead.
Change of investor paradigm
Change of investor paradigm
Mathias Burghardt explained that as intuitional investment capital will grow at a lower pace, the investment universe has also completely changed. Here too, Europe is late: whether financing the energy transition or the €800 billion required for digital innovation, energy transition and defense, responding to the shocks of our moment will require massive mobilization of private capital – notably individual private savings, which represents 50% of capital available.
The increasing ability for individual investors to access the alternatives markets is also a key opportunity for the households to diversify their portfolio and an important motor for economic growth in Europe, as it has been for the US in the past decades.
It’s a real challenge for the sector: transforming a private equity industry that has traditionally served institutional investors into one that increasingly engages individual investors. But that’s an entirely different business.
As a "data industry", finance is on the front line of these shifts. Burghardt explained that AI is changing the way private equity operates, from analysis to portfolio management. The intense investment this requires – in energy, infrastructure, data centers and water – favors players at scale and a concentration of resources.
Prediction, AI's next frontier?
Prediction, AI's next frontier?
Mathias Burghardt anticipates that AI's next step – a technological disruption that has never been seen before – will be prediction. This should help in the analysis of companies, identify sectors that will succeed in the future and change the way assets are priced.
A paradoxical thought in a world which has never felt more difficult to predict and in which, as Mathias reminded the audience, the best strategy remains diversification.
What AI brings – a technological disruption unlike any before – is the capacity to predict the future.
Innovation : The Shock of Transitions
Rewatch the panel here ↑
Mathias BURGHARDT, Executive Vice-President of Ardian, spoke on Saturday July 5 at the semi-plenary session 'Innovation: The Shock of Transitions', alongside Laurent BATAILLE, Chairman, Schneider Electric France, Anabel DIAZ, Vice-President of Uber in Europe, Middle East and Africa, UBER, Christel HEYDEMANN, Chief Executive Officer, Orange, and Paul HUDSON Chief Executive Officer, Sanofi.
The panel was moderated by Ruth ELKRIEF, Editorialist and coordinated by Alexandra ROULET, Member Le Cercle des économistes.
