BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, European leader in professional equipment finance, announces the successful issuance of its first securitisation on behalf of its affiliate BNP Paribas Lease Group SA.
The EUR 500 million transaction is the first ever public securitisation on professional equipment leasing contracts in Europe with a placement of all tranches to investors.
We are very pleased with the strong reception that this transaction has seen in the market and the trust that investors have shown in the platform. The success of this first transaction will allow BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions to extend its service offering to the benefit of its clients, which consist mainly of mid-size companies and SMEs in the real economy.” declared Isabelle Loc, CEO of BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions.
Transaction details
As the European leader in asset finance, BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions supports the growth of its clients and industrial partners by offering rental and finance solutions with services for their professional equipment.
At the heart of the usage economy, we provide businesses with the flexibility they need to remain competitive and grow in a sustainable way.
Our 3,700 experts support our clients’ and partners’ growth by offering them an increasingly digitalised experience.
In 2020, we financed 310,000 projects for a total volume of 12.8 billion euros in 20 countries, in Europe and also Asia, the United States and Canada.
Find out more on leasingsolutions.bnpparibas.com/en
Follow us on Twitter, Linkedin and YouTube
Pierre-Henri de la MARANDAIS –+33 (0)1 41 97 18 54 – pierre-henri.delamarandais@bnpparibas.com
Jérôme GOAER – +33 (0)6 61 61 79 34 – j.goaer@verbatee.com
Aline BESSELIEVRE – +33 (0)6 61 85 10 05 – a.besselievre@verbatee.com
Komatsu Group, a world leading manufacturer of construction, mining & utility equipment, and BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, European leader in professional equipment finance, have decided to extend their Cooperation Agreement to the Nordic region.
The Agreement was first launched in 2018 in France, Germany, Italy, and then in Belgium and the Netherlands. As part of the extension, it was launched in Sweden in mid-October before being extended to Norway and Denmark in the years to come. It will allow Komatsu Group to support their clients’ growth and development in this high potential region through finance solutions for their equipment needs.
Arnault Leglaye, CEO of BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions in the Nordics said, “I’m very happy to see Komatsu Finance and BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions join forces to offer innovative and competitive finance solutions to Komatsu’s clients. The fact that this long-term partnership is now extending to the Nordics is only proof of our close collaboration. We are confident of the market potential and our synergies to make it a success.”
“This is a long-term investment with the goal to offer Komatsu’s Nordic customers with sustainable and favorable investment terms. BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions is the perfect partner for us as we now establish in this region.”, commented Johan Appelros, Sales manager for Komatsu Finance in the Nordic region.
As the European leader in asset finance, BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions supports the growth of its clients and industrial partners by offering rental and finance solutions with services for their professional equipment.
At the heart of the usage economy, we provide businesses with the flexibility they need to remain competitive and grow in a sustainable way.
Our 3,700 experts support our clients’ and partners’ growth by offering them an increasingly digitalised experience.
In 2020, we financed 310,000 projects for a total volume of 12.8 billion euros in 20 countries, in Europe and also Asia, the United States and Canada.
Find out more on leasingsolutions.bnpparibas.com/en
Follow us on Twitter, Linkedin and YouTube
Pierre-Henri de la MARANDAIS –+33 (0)1 41 97 18 54 – pierre-henri.delamarandais@bnpparibas.com
Jérôme GOAER – +33 (0)6 61 61 79 34 – j.goaer@verbatee.com
Aline BESSELIEVRE – +33 (0)6 61 85 10 05 – a.besselievre@verbatee.com
For the past 70 years, we’ve been helping companies grow by allowing them to acquire the equipment they need. Thanks to the strong relationships we’ve built with equipment manufacturers and dealers, we’ve developed a cross-sector expertise and are in a position to foresee changes and trends.
We regularly expand the range of equipment we finance to include more sustainable equipment and those equipped with the latest technologies. We also adapt our suite of solutions and services to better respond to the evolving needs of our clients.
At the heart of the real economy, we support businesses by financing equipment that are essential to their growth. This involves a large range that has constantly evolved and expanded over the years.
Like in the 1950’s, when the focus was on rebuilding the French economy post-war, we channeled our resources to finance innovative equipment (by the 50’s standards!) like tractors, combine harvesters, cranes, trucks, forklifts, excavators and much more across the construction, agriculture, material handling and the transport sectors.
Later, with the advent of new technologies, businesses needed to finance newer types of equipment like computers, mobile phones, photocopiers and telecommunications infrastructures. Once again, we supported them through this major transformation.
Today, we still finance logistics and technology equipment in these well-known traditional sectors, through the strong relationships we’ve built with the major manufacturers and dealers.
We capitalise on our expertise in traditional markets to explore newer sectors, especially those that push for a more sustainable future.
We do this by financing more and more businesses and equipment that contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals defined by the United Nations.
Through our long-term presence in the traditional markets, we had already been contributing to helping feed the populations and build new and more sustainable infrastructures.
But we wanted to go further and take proactive steps to promote and support the positive-impact investments of our clients.
We therefore continue to enlarge the range of equipment financed to include those that promote ecological transition by reducing pollution, consuming less energy and/or by deriving energy from renewable sources. Like LED lighting systems, photovoltaic panels, cogeneration systems, etc. The latter, for instance, ensure that energy is generated in a more efficient and cleaner way and that the residual energy usually wasted, is put to use. To promote greener mobility, we also offer finance solutions for hybrid and electric buses and vehicles, their charging terminals, and for trucks running on NGV (Natural Gas for Vehicle) and BioGNV.
In addition to energy transition, we work in sectors like healthcare and recycling to promote Circular Economy. We fund medical equipment that ensure good health and well-being of the people. But also equipment for waste management and recycling which allow for a more sustainable management of equipment at the end of their lifecycle.
Maximising the value of raw materials is a major challenge for everyone, be it consumers, businesses, or even countries, since it involves limiting waste and preserving the Earth’s natural resources.
At BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, we aim to break away from the so-called linear economy of extracting, producing, using and disposing. For many years now, we have been pushing for a more circular model with the ambition to give a second or even a third life to professional equipment, in all sectors where this is possible. Finance, Recover, Refurbish, and Resell or Re-rent is our philosophy. A philosophy that resonates with all our customers who seek to limit the environmental impact of their activities. This is precisely what the solutions proposed by our subsidiaries BNP Paribas 3 Step IT and BNP Paribas Rental Solutions Trucks aim to do by working around the equipment life cycle. BNP Paribas 3 Step IT refurbishes 97% of the technological equipment at the end of the contract: this reduces the carbon footprint associated with equipment production and transport by 36%. BNP Paribas Rental Trucks maintains and repairs the vehicles it manages and ensures that they are resold at the end of the contract.
The Circular Economy model is a response to the new consumption patterns which involve paying for the use of an equipment, and not for its ownership. By leasing equipment from specialised companies, businesses get to completely outsource equipment management, particularly at the end of the contract. As the owner of the leased equipment, we recover the equipment and try giving it a second life, or recycle it according to environmental standards in cases where it can no longer be used.
While the preference for using an equipment has already started to dominate the will to own it, there is still a long way to achieve a true state of Usage Economy – a scenario in which the user would only pay for the actual use of his equipment, as in the case of industrial vehicles whose rents are calculated by the kilometre. Or like the first photocopiers that already offered the possibility to pay for the number of copies made.
This, again, makes for a truly virtuous model, since the objective is to keep using the equipment for as long as possible and to maximise its use. Even though the Internet of Things (IoT) has already given birth to pay-per-use services by offering the possibility to closely monitor the use of each machine, the road is still long. But it has a lot of potential and presents some great opportunities for companies, and we are ready to accompany them on this journey, as we have been doing on the ones towards Sustainable Development and Circular Economy.
We finance a wide range of professional logistics and technological equipment.
The health and economic crisis that marked 2020 hit the world in the most sudden and unexpected manner. A lot of businesses found themselves in a precarious situation and needed to be supported through specific measures.
Because our client base is spread out across several sectors, the impact of the health crisis and the sudden halt of the economic activity wasn’t the same for all of them. For example, essential activities like agriculture resisted well to the consequences of the crisis, because no matter what the situation is, countries around the world will always have to feed their populations. The IT equipment market was also one of the few sectors that was able to maintain their business inflow, particularly because of the accelerated pace at which companies had to implement work from home, to ensure the safety of their employees.
On the other hand, there were industries that saw a sharp decline in their activity due to the lockdowns, like transport (except for those in the food industry) and construction where economic activity fell by almost 50% in April. It was the same case for other non-food-related businesses like textiles and automobiles industries which suffered quite a lot.
To support these businesses, during this difficult and uncertain period, we introduced specific measures.
Thanks to the digitalisation of our processes that started several years ago and the introduction of new collaborative digital tools such as videoconferencing, our teams were able to remain in close contact with all our clients, despite the physical distance. They continued to respond to their requests, whether to finance a new project or to manage existing contracts.
In order to provide concrete support and help preserve the cash flow of our clients, we approved more than 160,000 requests for 3 to 6 months payment deferrals in all our countries, a third of which came from the clients of the banking network of BNP Paribas.
In order to respond to these requests as quickly and efficiently as possible, we deployed 15 robots that helped manage a large number of requests in an automated manner.
And for our clients wishing to finance new equipment, our European e-signature solution enabled them to sign their contracts remotely, in a secure manner.
As countries slowly exit the lockdowns, the focus is now on economic recovery, even though the local challenges specific to each country and each sector continue to persist.
Businesses will have to catch up to make up for the slowdown experienced during the past few months. And our teams are ready to support their future projects!
If you want to know more about our activity and our financing solutions, please contact us.
“We’re going through one of those phases where the only certainty is the uncertainty. Accurately predicting a likely scenario for economic rebound therefore becomes a complicated exercise – will we see a V-shaped recovery? A U? Or maybe even a W? As many countries start to come out of months of lockdown, will there be a second wave of COVID-19 that will upend all the efforts of companies to restart their activities? The questions are numerous, and the answers are mere estimates, at best.
However, as an international company serving other companies for 70 years there are certain indicators we’ve learnt to turn to.
In China, where we are present through a partnership with Jiangsu Financial Leasing, our business has almost returned to normal since mid-April. It reached around 80% of last year’s level, with some sectors still suffering losses, such as the cinema.
In Europe, the countries hit hardest by the health crisis – like Italy, France and the UK – show the most significant decline in activity. But this can’t be generalised for all the countries. Spain, for example, showed a slight increase in business in April despite a very critical situation. The Netherlands, Belgium and Germany also managed to maintain their activity in April at the same level as the same period last year.
On the markets side, we have seen that the agricultural sector has resisted quite well against the effects of the crisis, which can be explained by it being probably the most essential of all activities: countries will need to feed their people even during the lockdown. On the other hand, transport and construction were heavily affected and we recorded a decline in activity of about 50% in April. Another sector that resisted well was IT, as companies had to invest in large-scale homeworking solutions and we saw an acceleration of digitalisation like never before. Indeed, it is this sector of technological equipment that seems to have had the strongest recovery in May. As a result, curve seems to look like a V, but we remain cautious with our presumptions at this stage.
Despite a faint light at the end of this long tunnel that lasted more than two months, let us not forget that the shutdown of companies, factories and other independent businesses have had a dramatic impact on the financial situation of businesses in Europe. Therefore, in order to help them face this, we have re-organised ourselves to meet their requests for rescheduling contracts. We approved more than 144,000 requests for 3-6 months payment deferrals in all our countries. The largest volume of such requests came from France (around 60,000) and Italy (around 40,000).
To cope with this huge influx of requests, we set up automated processes in most countries. Our Robotics Process Automation (RPA) department, which existed even before the crisis, enabled us to deploy these new robots within 15 days. We therefore remain confident in our ability to support businesses, thanks to the adaptability and the flexibility of our people.
The crisis has brought forward many challenges, but beneath these challenges, there are also some underlying opportunities. It prompted us to implement new ways of working and management, more innovative and efficient processes, newer digital tools, and we want to continue to capitalise on these technological leaps we’ve taken during the crisis.
For instance, the remote connection capacity that was increased to allow all our employees to work from home will be maintained.
We also realised that, while travel is essential for maintaining strong relationships with our partners and clients, we can certainly reduce it and thereby limit our environmental footprint.
Contributing to a more sustainable and inclusive future will become more important than ever and, as we slowly emerge from the crisis, our ambition will be to finance even more equipment and businesses that support energy transition and to further develop our circular economy solutions.
This crisis must not be a brake on sustainable development but rather an accelerator. In any case, this is how we see it at BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions!”
Translation of the article published by
CEO of BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, this former senior official at the Ministry of Economy and Finance has brought a breath of fresh air to the French banking group’s leasing branch. An exceptional team leader and art enthusiast, Charlotte Dennery does not make any concessions when it comes to equality.
Maurice Midena
On the wall behind Charlotte Dennery’s desk is an acrylic canvas painting by Paul Kallos. “Sacre du Printemps” measuring 1.95 m in height and 2.60 m in length, represents a series of large rectangular strips in green and blue with touches of yellow and orange here and there. This work by the French-Hungarian contemporary artist who died in 2001 comes from BNP Paribas’ private collection. Art is a serious matter for Charlotte Dennery, who, in her spare time, if we can call it that, is a Director of the National Museum Association-Grand Palais (Réunion des Musées Nationaux-Grand Palais) (RMN-GP).
The 53-year old woman switches from the muted and intentionally delicate world of art to the much more prosaic world of leasing with ease. For the past three and a half years, she has been managing the BNP Paribas Group’s “Leasing Solutions” branch. Leasing is a general term that corresponds to two different finance methods used by companies on a daily basis: rental and leasing. These solutions allow them to use a piece of equipment in exchange for the payment of a regular fee. They are therefore a key player of the usage economy.
“Leasing is at the heart of the real economy,” explains Charlotte Dennery. Thanks to this method, companies of all sizes and sectors are able to acquire equipment of all types: from tractors and forklifts to dentist chairs, or a fleet of smartphones. At BNP Paribas, leasing provides jobs for 3,400 people in 18 countries and represents €32.1 billion of assets under management. Since Charlotte Dennery’s arrival, the bank’s subsidiary on “rue d’Antin” has progressed from €10.1 billion to €13.5 billion of new leasing contracts per year.
Charlotte Dennery instigated this great performance by bringing a modern air to a branch that was considered to be lacking innovation. The first challenge was the digitalisation of business. Initially the digital transition involved the automation of processes and, in particular, the customer and partner journeys (leasing is a solution offered by manufacturers that sell equipment). From the simulation of payment schedules to the final signature of the contract, including the verification of the customer’s solvency, everything is now done online. “We sign 3.5 contracts a minute. It was essential to digitalise our services in order to achieve such a level of industrialisation,” explains Mrs. Dennery. With such processes, the response time for a company wishing to take out a financing contract has reduced from several days to several hours.
But digitalisation is not limited to better serving those who benefit from leasing services. It also concerns the people who implement these services. A remarkable leader, always on the lookout for new forms of management, Charlotte Dennery put into place a “reverse mentoring” programme wherein the younger recruits of the company train the elder ones in new digital practices and social media. “It was a 25-year old employee from the finance division who taught me how to get the most out of the opportunities offered by my smartphone.”
Apart from digital transformation, one of the biggest changes initiated by the CEO was the change of office premises: since March 2017, the old building in Puteaux where the concept of “higher your grade, more windows you get in your office” has disappeared to make way for a brand-new flex-office space in Nanterre, where almost no-one has their own office. In addition, homeworking of generally two days a week has been put into place. “All these measures are working very well,” she states. “It facilitates communication and has really changed the work atmosphere for the better among the teams.”
It would be an understatement to say that Charlotte Dennery knows the BNP Paribas’ teams well. She has been with the company since 2001. She started out in Group Strategy before taking over the financial direction of the insurance branch, and then becoming COO – Chief Operating Officer – of BNP Paribas Investment Partners, the business branch specialising in the group’s asset management, from 2010 to 2015.
Charlotte Dennery is not really what you would call a social climber. She tends more to follow in her parents’ footsteps. Daughter of a diplomat, the CEO was born in Tokyo. She has also lived in Moscow and Brazzaville. Third child in a family with very varied career paths, she has a brother who is head of the anaesthetic-resuscitation service at the Georges Pompidou hospital, another who is a senior civil servant, and a sister in charge of an art foundation.
A brilliant student, Charlotte Dennery joined the preparatory class at the Lycée Henri IV after completing her baccalaureate at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand. She repeated her second year at Saint-Louis. “I attended all the high schools in the Latin quarter,” she laughs. She joined the Ecole Polytechnique in 1985. Graduating three years later, she completed her studies with a Master’s degree at ENSAE, a top-ranking higher education institution that specialises in statistics. She then joined the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies (INSEE), where she was responsible for analysing the Nation’s quarterly accounts. She then spent six years working in the Budget department.
Although she was able to benefit from opportunities that favoured excellence from a young age, Charlotte Dennery quickly realised that this was not the case for everyone. The inequality between men and women, turned out to be in particular much greater than she had ever imagined: “When I worked at Bercy (the Ministry of Economy and Finance), women were starting to hold more and more important positions. However, when I joined BNP Paribas, I saw that there were very few of them, especially in the Board of Directors,” she explains.
Charlotte Dennery implemented various measures to balance out this situation. Traditional measures, like mentoring and coaching as well as more direct initiatives: “Each year, I make sure that the salary increments are the same for women and men, even sometimes slightly higher for women because there tends to be some setbacks for them like when they take maternity leave. Therefore, we try and make up.” The same applies to promotions, with everyone receiving equal treatment.
Charlotte Dennery is a role model for many women, especially in a sector as masculine as banking. And she appears to want to increase the sources of inspiration around her, whether in terms of careers or works of art.
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Leasing is a growth vector for SMEs in Europe. More and more use leasing to finance their investments : 50% in 2014 vs 40% in 2010. Find out more with our infographics!
On April 26, 2016, the European Investment Bank (EIB) and BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions announced they signed a partnership agreement on a pan-European EUR 400 million financing, designed for enabling Small & Medium enterprises (SMEs) and midcaps to benefit from financing solutions under preferential terms.
60% of this significant funding envelope from the EIB will be dedicated to the French market. It will consist in a EUR 400 million financing line, that BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions will be running, to increase the support to SMEs and midcaps within the European Union.
Eligible companies for this financing line are:
Each financed project will cover a maximum amount of EUR 25 million.
Involved companies will benefit from the EIB intervention by means of reduced interest rates on their credit or on their leasing.
This overall envelope of EUR 400 million will thus enable BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions to finance entrepreneurial projects in 5 countries –France, UK, Belgium, Spain and the Netherlands– and to actively contribute to the financing of the real economy, relying on its main partners (manufacturers, editors and their distribution networks). Several business sectors, which resort to BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions’ products and services on a very regular basis to finance their professional equipment, will indeed take advantage of this financial support to their investments: agriculture, construction and public works, handling, transport, office equipment, IT, telecoms, specialised technologies.
Charlotte Dennery, Chief Executive Officer of BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, underlines the importance of this partnership: “Considering the whole range of operations we are financing as a European leader in professional equipment’s leasing, we inject close to EUR 10 billion every year into the economy and I am glad that we signed this partnership with the EIB for a significant amount of EUR 400 million. These subsidised financings will directly benefit to a large base of small and middle-market companies, which are key to the vitality of our economies and will allow them to develop their business”.“
I am very pleased to sign this major financing agreement with BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, also commented Ambroise Fayolle, Vice-President of the EIB. With this new credit line, we are committed to supporting employment, competitiveness and growth of the SMEs and the midcaps. We promote economic dynamism which is essential to our European economies. Our support in favour of companies is reinforced by the European Fund for Strategic Investment (SIEF), a key component of the investment plan for Europe, also called “plan Juncker.” To date, the EIB Group has approved more than 200 projects with the guarantee of the SIEF, which will mobilise a total investment of 76 billion euros, nearly a quarter of the target total of EUR 315 billion, in 23 countries of the European Union.”
Aiming at boosting growth and employment, support to SMEs and midcaps is a priority for the EIB Group, which provides them with a wide range of instruments. The amount of the financings granted by the EIB to SMEs and midcaps within the European Union tends to increase every year. In 2015, it reached EUR 23.3 billion and allowed to finance the investments of 120,000 SMEs and middle-market companies.
About the European Investment Bank
The European Investment Bank (EIB), which is owned by the European Union Member State, is the long-term financing institution of the European Union. The EIB provides long-term financing for sound, sustainable investment projects in support of EU policy goals in Europe.
Find out more: www.eib.org
Follow the EIB on Twitter @EIBtheEUBank
New research from Quocirca sponsored by BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions reveals many SMBs are not aware that financing could help them make shrinking IT budgets go further.
For the research “Using ICT financing for strategic gain”, Quocirca asked respondents their general views on financing and leasing, and their thoughts about ICT financing in particular. The results reveal that many SMBs are unaware how ICT financing works, preferring to spend cash on ICT purchases. The research also revealed that few resellers include a finance option during sales negotiations.
Key findings from the research include:
Benoît Dilly, UK Country Manager at BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions, believes the findings of the Quocirca research offer a golden opportunity for resellers: “Now is a great time for SMBs to procure ICT through financing. With budgets increasingly restricted, financing is the ideal way for them to get the technology they need to achieve their goals and go for growth. BNP Paribas Leasing Solutions is ideally placed to help resellers lead their discussions with financing, in order to make more strategic ICT sales to SMBs. In 2012, we supported nearly 40,000 UK businesses across all sectors invest in £1.1 billion of capital equipment, to help them progress their strategic goals. By working with us, resellers have an excellent opportunity to shift SMBs’ ad-hoc ICT purchasing practices towards more mutually beneficial, strategic business relationships.”
