INSEAD AFTERMARKET EXECUTIVE PROGRAM BY NEXUS - SESSION 2

SESSION 2: SEPTEMBER 30 - OCTOBER 2, 2025

SUMMARY

• Introduction - Gaël Escribe .p.6-7

• Legal session NEXUS antitrust & confidentiality guidelines Natascha Tsalas .p.8-9

• Navigating the future of the aftermarket - Michel Forissier .p.10-11

• What do we want to achieve together? - Loïc Sadoulet .p.12-13

• Servitization: smarter parts, smarter services, smarter platforms - Wolfgang Ulaga p.14-15

• From alignment debt to action: ai-powered human-centered strategic alignment - Maya Ben Dror .p.16-17

• Transforming without losing the soul - a human-centered playbook fo big-scale change - Barbara Martin Coppola .p.18-19

• Building a coalition of the willing: creating value together, for everyone’s - Suzanna Perrier & Sylvie Layec .p.20-21

• Evening debrief - Loïc Sadoulet .p.22-23

• Partnering with customers for innovation and change - Dominique Moïsi .p.24-25

• Reflection session - Loïc Sadoulet p.28-29

• Partnering with customers for innovation and change - Nicolas Swetchine .p.30-31

• Valuing future-proofness: a financial framework - Dominique Jacquet .p.32-33

• Case study: China, ECAV and new investment models - Hakan Dogu p.34-35

• From compliance to advantage: sustainability as strategic value creation - Loïc Sadoulet .p.36-37

• Digital & AI - what executives need to know - Theodoros Evgeniou .p.40-41

• Monetize, mobilize, maximize: how utility tokens unlock the true power of your community - Dom Einhorn p.42-43

• Closing session - Loïc Sadoulet .p.44-45

• Farewell and closing words - Gaël Escribe .p.46-47

Design and production: Nexus Automotive International SA, Chemin du Château-Bloch 11, 1219 Le Lignon | Geneva | Switzerland - www.nexusautomotiveinternational.eu - Photo credits: Sandrine Mulas - www.sandmulaseyes.com

DAY 1

SEPTEMBER 30, 2025

INTRODUCTION

Gaël Escribe - CEO, NEXUS Automotive International

Gaël Escribe, NEXUS Automotive International CEO began by explaining the program’s move back to Fontainebleau. The last session was in the Geneva region. This time, he

wanted to be close to INSEAD students,

the classic audience for this kind of work.

He explained how the program came together over the past year. With Loïc’s early support, the team planned for a tough 2025. It felt like a year full of surprises, hard to predict, with uncertain geopolitics. Because of that uncertainty, the program was designed as a 2½-day sprint. It was built for busy NEXUS leaders who can’t spend months at a university. The goal was to step back, look at the big picture, and make it simpler. This way, everyone would leave with a short list of clear priorities at the end of the event. Clarity was the first objective.

This second session would also provide practical tools. It is meant to help shape 2026 budgets and mid-term strategy—deciding what can wait, what is urgent, and what is growing fast and should be added to plans and setups. The time is short, but the last edition showed how much focused work can happen in two and a half days.

Gaël shared feedback from a Tier-1 supplier. That leader said the program helped “switch the brain back on.” Daily routines – hundreds of emails and constant problem-solving, had pushed real thinking aside. The few days together helped capture ideas important for the company’s future and for personal growth.

He also stressed that this is not a one-off event. The program will return next year: one session again in Fontainebleau and one on the INSEAD Singapore campus. In 2027, a Level Two track will start, for people who completed this session, running in parallel with the main track. The aim is to make this a recurring program for the NEXUS community, bring in speakers from other industries, keep the view wider than the automotive aftermarket, and focus on what to do and what to prioritize.

LEGAL SESSION NEXUS ANTITRUST & CONFIDENTIALITY GUIDELINES

Natascha Tsalas - Director, Legal & Intellectual Property at NEXUS AUTOMOTIVE INTERNATIONAL

Natascha Tsalas, Director, Legal & Intellectual Property at NEXUS Automotive International set the tone clearly: innovation and collaboration are central to NEXUS, but collaboration can carry legal risks. The goal of the session was to learn the rules that let people work together productively and stay compliant.

She then explained the basics of antitrust and confidentiality. Antitrust law protects fair competition. It stops competitors from colluding and keeps markets open for customers. In a room with competitors, the biggest risk is that casual talk slides into collusion— sometimes without people realizing it.

Confidentiality becomes an antitrust issue when it involves sensitive information like prices or margins. It also stands on its own: companies must respect contracts and protect intellectual property. Why does this matter? Because the downside is serious: large fines, damage to reputation, and even personal liability. She pointed to European Commission cases to show how real this is. Investigations take years, and the companies involved are not fringe players, they’re major manufacturers, suppliers, and tech firms. The same violations keep appearing: price coordination, collusion, and market allocation.

Natascha walked through how the European Commission enforces the rules. The system reaches back to the 1957 Treaty of Rome and today’s Directorate-General for Competition. Two tools matter a lot. First, the leniency program (1996, strengthened in 2006): a company in a cartel that reports the cartel and provides solid evidence can get immunity from fines. That’s why many cases come to light—insiders speak up. Second, settlements: if a company accepts the decision early, it gets a discount on the fine. The outcome has been record fines, sometimes in the billions.

She noted that recent cases go beyond classic products (like bearings or trucks) into software and sustainability. One example: bundled infotainment apps—Play, Assistant, and Maps, were required to be unbundled so others could compete. The message is simple: regulators understand the automotive space very well and act quickly. The “gain” from collusion is never worth the risk.

To make it practical, she offered a quick scenario check – all the following are unsafe:

• “Let’s all hold off on discounts next year.” >> Price-fixing.

• “What’s your margin on spare parts?” >> Sharing sensitive information.

• “Why don’t we divide the market?” >> Market allocation.

• “Let’s stop buying from Supplier X to pressure them.” >> Illegal boycott.

• “For this tender, you bid low; we’ll submit higher offers.” >> Bid-rigging.

Everyone should stay in the “green zone”, exchanging non-sensitive, pro-competitive insights, while they continue the trainings, challenge ideas, and build the aftermarket’s future together.

NAVIGATING THE FUTURE OF THE AFTERMARKET

Michel Forissier - CEO of THEMEEGOO and Former Chief Engineering and Marketing Officer at Valeo

Michel Forissier, , CEO of THEMEEGOO and former Chief Engineering & Marketing Officer at Valeo began by saying he is not an aftermarket specialist. He is a car engineer with 42 years in the industry: 15 at Renault and 27 at Valeo, where he ended as Chief Engineering & Marketing Officer. He is formally retired, but still active because, in his words, the industry has never been more exciting. He now advises several companies, including two new carmakers. One is a startup in small mobility, the other focused on people with special mobility needs. In both cases, he said, the aftermarket must be designed in from day one or the business won’t work.

He offered a simple view of history. The 20 th century car story moved from pioneers, to luxury, to mass-market vehicles—with mostly incremental engineering. He believes the 21st century will replay that arc with EVs and new tech: we had early pioneers in the 2000s, we now see a bloom of luxury EV brands, and the next step must be true popular models. The question is what will trigger that shift, and how the aftermarket can be ready.

He sketched four big forces. First, EVs are the new normal: the 2035 targets are set, and the race with

China is on. For the aftermarket this means fewer clutches and oil changes, but a different service model and big opportunities for those who adapt. Second, digital and connected cars will change business models; if independents don’t move into datadriven services, others will. Third, China is the only car market still growing strongly; local brands have gone from lagging to leading in a few years. Fourth, advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) pack vehicles with sensors and software that need calibration and care. The data they create can support new offers.

Two global pressures frame everything: decarbonization and limited resources. Transport is a large share of emissions, and access to critical minerals is tightening. That points to circularity: repairing, reusing, and remanufacturing before recycling.

He sees light mobility rising fast: scooters, e-bikes, and microcars are everywhere as cities close to traditional cars. Service for these vehicles is still weak, so there is room for aftermarket players to step in. Affordability is a hard problem. In Europe, average car prices are up by about €12,000 in ten years. Regulations may explain €2-3k, general inflation €2-3k, and the rest is mix and “moving upmarket.” Salaries did not keep pace, so demand is soft because people can’t afford cars, and not because they don’t want them. The aftermarket goal should be keeping parts and services affordable.

He also noted a generation gap. The average newcar buyer in Europe is around 58; one Japanese brand is near 60; Tesla is closer to 45; and in China it is about 34. Younger buyers want different things and research heavily. Microcars are climbing in cities, and policy makers are pushing for sub-€25,000 EVs. Those vehicles will need fast, low-cost service— workshops’ sweet spot.

Delivery is changing too. He pointed to a giant Chinese food-delivery platform with hundreds of millions of users, over half a million riders, and autonomous robots running 24/7. The takeaway: last-mile electric fleets will need maintenance at scale—new fleet, new service. He expects the mainstream EV wave to come from entry models under €25k; in Europe, with about half of sales to fleets and leases, those cars will quickly fill workshops.

On the digital customer relationship, he warned that OEM apps already book service and pre-order parts. That’s convenient for drivers but risks locking out independents. Fair access to in-vehicle data is essential for the aftermarket. Meanwhile, rising electronics complexity changes repair economics: a light bumper hit can disable radar or lidar and cost thousands. There is space for smart, safe, lower-cost fixes, strong ADAS calibration offers, new ties with insurers, and clear pricing.

He is skeptical about full autonomy in the next decade. Robo-taxis may work in limited zones, but that is a niche, not the total vehicle parc. The idea that autonomy will soon eliminate crashes and body shops, looks far off. Software-defined vehicles are also a mixed bag: architectures are centralizing, suppliers ship more hardware with less software, and “features after the sale” rarely sell well—while Chinese rivals often price software at or near zero. For independents, a patchwork of OEM software stacks makes tools and training harder. Standards would help, but we are not there yet.

He pressed for real circularity. At Valeo he saw how hard it is to get cores back: in one case, only ~3% of alternators returned from the aftermarket. Without organized collection, circular flows stall. A headlamp pilot showed the potential: about 80% of units that looked “broken” still had working LEDs and electronics, so reman became viable with plastic repair and testing—saving money and cutting lead times. Reuse platforms can deliver in 24 hours. This is practical business, not theory.

His advice to the aftermarket was concrete:

• Own the customer relationship with convenience and transparency (including mobile service where possible)

• Shift the offer toward high-voltage systems, electronics, software services, calibration, and datadriven maintenance while keeping core items like tires, wipers, and glass

• Invest in people and tools: diagnostics, ADAS, battery health, software workflows

• Remember the human moment when a driver is stranded

• Push for parts and data standards

• Prepare for an ICE tail (2035–2050) as owners keep older cars alive, stock and standardize accordingly.

He closed on a simple point: change is everywhere, but the opportunities are bigger than the risks if the aftermarket moves now: staying close to customers, fighting for data access and standards, investing in skills, and engaging OEMs for transparency. Without a strong, innovative aftermarket, mobility’s future won’t be sustainable.

WHAT DO WE WANT TO ACHIEVE TOGETHER?

Loïc Sadoulet - INSEAD Professor

Loïc Sadoulet, INSEAD Professor opened with a story from Belgian field hockey. After the national team won gold in Tokyo, their mental coach brought the players together. He told them there was good news: they were Olympic champions, and bad news: because the Tokyo Games were delayed to 2021, they had only three years to get ready for Paris 2024. Then he asked one question: “What would make Paris disappointing, bad, or a disaster?”

Players answered openly: disappointment might be doing worse than Tokyo or playing in empty stadiums again. Someone even joked about “COVID-24.” “Bad” could mean infighting or talented but toxic teammates. “Disaster” might be a doping case or the Games being canceled.

The point, Loïc said, was ownership: when players set their own “red lines,” they also own the job of staying above them. He then flipped the question to the positive: “What would make Paris great, or even a dream?” Answers ranged from inspiring the next generation to, half-jokingly, “mentoring the Belgian government.” The exercise mapped the whole field, from unacceptable to aspirational.

He proposed using the same method for the INSEAD Executive Aftermarket Program by NEXUS’s next 2½ days. In small groups, people would first define the negative: what would count as disappointing, bad, or a disaster, and they had to make these measurable (“no interaction in plenary sessions,” for example, not just “boring”). Then they would define the positive: what would make the program great, and what their dream outcome would be. Loïc asked teams to take 5–6 minutes, then bring results together into a working contract that the group would post and review at every break, adjusting in real time if things drifted.

• Disappointing: little or no participation; content too Europe-centric for a global audience; great conversations but no change afterward; fewer than

two concrete ideas to implement; topics too highlevel to use; fewer than five new connections (a quick hello doesn’t count); no new perspectives and no desire to return.

• Bad: visible disengagement; no business value; an unfinished agenda because of poor timekeeping (rather than rich debate); failure to link benchmarks to the aftermarket; good ideas but no influence back at the company; people leaving early from boredom or outside distractions.

• Great: at least two ideas to act on, ideally one breakthrough; clear ROI and a sense that bringing more team members next time would multiply returns; a viewpoint that truly shifts how you think; a five-year playbook (vision plus first steps); not just contacts but meaningful relationships; energy to promote the program internally and with partners; and a learning community that outlives the week.

• Dream: the start of a business transformation: “I’m a new person”; and five credible answers to a complicated world.

Loïc closed by saying the team would print and post the “working contract”, check against it during the breaks, and adjust fast. Many had traveled far and were spending real work time, so the goal was to make the 2½ days not just “not bad,” but decisively great.

SERVITIZATION: SMARTER PARTS, SMARTER SERVICES, SMARTER PLATFORMS

Wolfgang Ulaga - Professor at INSEAD

Wolfgang Ulaga, Professor at INSEAD set the tone quickly: his passion is service with a capital S. Not service as an add-on, but as a strategy. Too many firms spend money to build giant data lakes, he argued, but forget the real question: how do we turn data into revenue?

He named the problem many manufacturers face: commoditization. If your product looks like everyone else’s, price becomes the only lever, what he called “commodity hell,” a red-ocean fight where value is given away. You can respond by specializing, by stripping back to a no-frills offer, or, often smartest, by combining product and service to create new value.

To show what this looks like, he told the story of Bossard, a Swiss “fastening” company (think screws, but more). Years ago, Bossard’s website was just a parts catalog. Over time they moved to owning customer problems: ordering, stocking, inspection, pre-assessment: the unseen work around the bolt. Wolfgang calls this the “price-berg”: the visible sticker price sits above the waterline, but the real value sits below it, in all the services that remove waste, delay, and risk for the customer.

He added a technical example: bearings. Bearings fail for ordinary reasons: poor lubrication, weak sealing, bad installation, and vibration. Each “reason” is a service opportunity: better lubrication programs, sealing solutions, training, and remote monitoring to catch problems before breakdowns. The strategic question is, “Which problems do we choose to own?” That choice becomes the backbone of a service portfolio.

Wolfgang contrasted “after-sales service” (reactive fixes after the sale) with service as a growth engine. At Fenwick (forklifts), a new service marketing team mapped customer headache: energy rules, safety, maintenance, “who drove the truck when,” driver training, even warehouse consulting, and turned them into sellable offers. The portfolio grew around pain points, not products.

He offered a simple roadmap, which most firms follow:

1. Start with product-attached services (repairs, retrofits).

2. Shift to output-based services (promise productivity or uptime, not just hours of labor).

3. Move into the customer’s process (full solutions and process support). It’s a double shift: from inputs to outcomes, and from your product to the customer’s workflow.

The well-known case is Michelin: moving from selling tires to selling kilometers. That model is complex. Contracts have an entry-run-exit structure and dozens of clauses to handle different fleets, uses, terrains, and risks. Customers worry about lock-in, variable costs, and trust (“Is the per-km price fair?”). Driver behavior can also swing results. On the channel side, dealers may resist if they feel cut out: classic channel conflict that demands new incentives and ways of working. None of this works without change management across sales, service, and leadership. Digital tools raise the stakes. Michelin and others are pushing IoT so every tire, truck, or machine throws off data that can be turned into service value. But once you sell a recurring offer, expectations rise: customers now ask, “What value did you deliver this month? What’s new? Where are the upgrades?” You need systems for billing, analytics, and constant improvement.

He showed a different sector to prove the point: a portable ultrasound sold as a monthly bundle (hardware + software + data). The relationship changes:

you’re paid to keep delivering value, not just to deliver a box. That means more touchpoints, more updates, and a higher bar to prove impact.

This shift is everywhere. As one investor famously said, “every product becomes a smart product.” Companies like Schneider Electric are training teams for subscriptions. Even heavy-duty equipment makers such as Caterpillar now sell connected services (e.g., $150 for connectivity, $200 for fleet reports, $300 for advanced analysis). With a big installed base, even modest attach rates can create nine-figure annual recurring revenue, and the data helps improve products, track assets, and drive cross-sell/ upsell.

To run this model well, firms need a recurring-revenue dashboard: customer acquisition cost, churn, lifetime value, cohort health, expansion revenue. Top performers do three things: acquire, retain, and expand accounts through cross-sell and upsell. That’s why Customer Success roles have exploded: their job is to make sure customers get the promised value and then grow with the offer.

Wolfgang’s bottom line: escaping commoditization means owning important customer problems and tying revenue to outcomes, supported by data and strong change management. Start where you are, pick the pains you’ll solve, instrument everything, and build a portfolio that climbs from repairs >> results >> processes. That’s servitization in practice.

FROM ALIGNMENT DEBT TO ACTION: AI-POWERED HUMANCENTERED STRATEGIC ALIGNMENT

Maya Ben Dror - Co-founder & COO ComplexChaos

Maya Ben Dror, co-founder & COO ComplexChaos was invited to help the group think about data, digitalization, and AI. Not as automation for its own sake, but to connect people, systems, and decisions. She framed the goal simply: build a kind of “digital brain” for the organization that links technology, structure, and leadership.

Her starting point was trust. Growing up in a kibbutz, she experienced simple, self-governed systems—like borrowing shared cars by writing your name and return time on a paper by the kitchen. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked because people accepted some mess and still cooperated. For her, many conflicts don’t come from disagreement but from disconnects between words, meanings, and actions.

From there, she contrasted human communication with digital communication. In person, most of what we convey is non-verbal: tone, posture, energy. Online, those signals get flattened, yet we treat typed words as if they carried the same richness. The result is confusion and, for leaders, a habit of

choosing among options presented by the system instead of shaping the real choices. Data piles up, clarity gets lost.

Leadership, she argued, now means staying connected after decisions are made. You cannot decide once and disappear. The new muscle is engagement. Helping people bring their physical, cognitive, and emotional selves to work. That’s hard in large firms and harder across generations: many over 35 prefer to talk; many younger employees prefer to chat. Meanwhile, surveys show high disengagement and a willingness to leave for flexibility or pay. The question is how to rebuild engagement at scale.

To explain how technology reshapes systems, Maya drew on socio-technical transition theory: niche innovations don’t just change a product; they reconfigure whole regimes: rules, markets, habits. She recalled living through severe pollution in China in 2013 and watching the government run city-level EV pilots to learn by doing. The lesson: accept failure and iterate; only experimentation reveals the real side effects and the actors you must bring along.

On AI, she cautioned against the idea that “humans are removed from the loop.” Humans are the context, and the error AI often tries to correct. Most road accidents, she noted, might be avoided with just two more seconds of driver response, but people are distracted by design. When AI scales work, it can also scale harm; leaders must plan for unintended consequences, talk openly about failures, and improve evaluation as they go. She contrasted 2024’s rush for efficiency with a new push to use AI as a companion, noting, for example, how readily people share sensitive information with AI and the risks that come with that.

She used a small story to show how users repurpose technology: on the first days of UberPool in Chengdu, she found a package riding “in the trunk” because it was cheaper and faster than normal delivery. People will always use systems in unexpected ways. In big companies, many departments, layers, channels, this unpredictability makes tidy “alignment” unrealistic. The better aim is coherence: a steady, repeated message and a shared way of working anchored in integrity. She pointed to Dieselgate and to studies in China showing large gaps between reported and real CO₂ emissions as reminders that integrity cannot be a slogan, it must be enforced through practice.

Practically, she said, leaders won’t have all the answers. The job is to ask questions continuously, especially in uncomfortable places and involve everyone in sense-making. To demonstrate, she invited the room to try her team’s tool: participants scanned a QR code, had a short voice conversation guided by an AI facilitator, and saw how responses appear as transcripts with timestamps. The system can group quotes, surface majority views and outliers, and extract actions people request—while letting users trace summaries back to exact words (not a black box).

She cited research showing that an AI facilitator can sometimes produce summaries that make more people feel represented than human facilitators. The point, for her, isn’t “consensus” as uniformity; it’s transparent synthesis, showing groups what they said together so leaders can explain why a decision is X instead of Y. The tool also ranks off-topic but useful ideas and lets teams question their own data. Her only warning: when using an open model interface, avoid sharing private information.

The session closed with an invitation to practice. In small groups, participants would define a topic, run short AI-guided conversations, generate insights, and judge whether the outputs felt accurate. Later, similar challenges would be matched across people to spark deeper exchange. The aim was simple: start building shared coherence with integrity, open questions, and hands-on tools, so strategy becomes something people create together, not a document handed down.

TRANSFORMING WITHOUT LOSING THE SOUL - A HUMANCENTERED PLAYBOOK FO BIG-SCALE CHANGE

Barbara Martin Coppola - ex Decathlon CEO

First, she would describe what she found on arriving at Decathlon; then the room would debate three strategic choices a CEO could make; finally, she would reveal what actually happened.

The situation she walked into Decathlon, founded in 1976 by Michel Leclerc, had grown from the north of France into a global retailer: about 1,700 stores in 78 countries, large warehouse networks, roughly €16 billion in revenue, and an estimated 170 million customers. The company sells gear for 80 sports under one roof and is among the world’s largest bike sellers. That scope creates a very complex supply chain: different materials, parts, and geographies, supported by dozens of key industrial partners and many more smaller ones. Inside the company, 100,000 employees showed very high engagement, tied to clear values and a sense of ownership. In several markets (France, Spain, Italy) Decathlon was rated a great place to work. Yet there was a perception gap. Internally, people saw Decathlon as technical, high-quality, and a true maker (a large share of sales comes from in-house brands). Externally, many customers saw it as cheap,

with lower expertise, limited access to their favorite brands, “mostly for beginners,” and light on style, more a distributor than a maker. Growth remained positive over 49 years, but the brand skewed to the low end. In the mid-tier, shoppers still bought, but less than the market’s growth, in the high tier, Decathlon lagged. At the same time, the low end was under attack from ultra-cheap, hyper-digital Chinese players like Shein and Temu moving into sports. On the high-end, branded players won with story, experience, and perceived quality.

Digital was also behind. E-commerce growth at Decathlon trailed the market; delivery often took four days versus competitors’ one day. Digital’s share of revenue hovered around 3%, compared with roughly 6% at omnichannel peers and near 20% for pureplay online retailers. The cost of the value chain ran higher than best-in-class. The brand felt fragmented

across countries, and the store experience had not evolved enough. Younger shoppers, who care about brands with opinions and values, were drifting away; the average customer age kept rising with the company’s age.

Three strategic options for a CEO

Barbara asked the room to consider three paths.

1. Reposition upward. Invest in brand and customer experience, move a bit more premium (without losing visibility), and build loyalty. Risks: cost, time, and possible identity issues. Employees are mission-driven, so if you tilt too far and you could alienate staff or core customers. The group discussed tactics such as technical partnerships, sports sponsorships, and selective premium lines alongside the core offer, while noting the danger of moving too slowly with Chinese entrants at the door.

2. Modernize to stay the affordable leader. Compete head-on on efficiency: modernize the supply chain, logistics, data, and processes to deliver faster and cheaper. The room listed Chinese strengths: scale, cost, logistics, agility, digital-native ways of working, rapid test-and-learn, and then what Decathlon would need: infrastructure, data quality, training, culture change, clear processes and KPIs, plus pilots that localize before scaling and standard operating procedures once a model works. Why do so many transformations fail? Participants cited lack of buy-in, fear of job loss, weak involvement, and low urgency (“we’re doing fine—why change?”). The remedy is visible quick wins, honest change management, and consistent incentives.

3. Build services (especially circularity). Go beyond selling goods to selling services: repairs, second-hand, leasing/rental, training plans, routes and coaching—offers that create lifetime value and a reason to return. The group argued Decathlon’s biggest differentiator might be its people and stores: passionate sport users who could deliver in-person experiences rivals can’t. Risks include new skills, pricing, operational complexity, and whether engagement stays high when the business model changes.

What they actually did

Barbara then summarized the path chosen. The leadership set a long-term North Star and rewrote the mission: from “accessibility” toward “moving people

through the wonders of sport.” That shift kept values intact but opened space for new models, including products and services. Transformation focused on three domains: customer experience (elements of repositioning), the planet (including circularity), and modernization/digitalization to improve cost, speed, and reliability.

On brand and experience, Decathlon refreshed its logo and identity, standardized the look and feel across countries, and expanded partnerships (including the Olympics, where volunteers wore Decathlon gear). They created expert brands to reach new audiences and simplified a confusing sprawl of labels into clearer sport universes. NPS rose markedly (from roughly 30 to 60) as digital touchpoints and storytelling improved.

On operations, the team attacked forecasting, endto-end data connectivity, and availability, which are critical for both customer satisfaction and building the data exhaust needed for prediction. Process clarity, the right systems, skills, organization, and aligned incentives underpinned the change.

On circularity, Decathlon built a store-centered engine, including repairs, second-hand, and leasing, through careful pilots. Some models (e.g., shortterm rental) proved too complex, others scaled fast. Within three years, circularity generated about €500 million in revenue, with strong growth (second-hand +53% YoY; rental +73%). Circular customers often returned more frequently, creating a “virtuous circle” of loyalty and lifetime value.

On sustainability, Decathlon pushed material and product redesign to decarbonize absolute emissions, with circularity contributing to the goal. The broader lesson Barbara emphasized: the winning play wasn’t a single bet, but a portfolio: some repositioning to refresh relevance, heavy modernization to protect affordability, and targeted services (especially circular) that fit Decathlon’s people and stores.

She closed by bringing it back to leadership. Strategy only sticks when people see the why, feel part of the how, and can point to visible progress. Decathlon’s case showed that with a clear North Star, honest change management, and disciplined pilots, even a very large retailer can move, without losing the mission that made it special.

BUILDING A COALITION OF THE WILLING: CREATING VALUE TOGETHER, FOR EVERYONE’S

Suzanna Perrier– Digital Products Director at ZF

Sylvie Layec – Senior Vice President Parts&Services, Sales&Marketing, Global, STELLANTIS Group

Suzanna Perrier, Global head of commercial strategy and sales at ZF opened with a blunt message: The biggest risk to the industry isn’t EVs, Chinese OEMs, or AI, it’s the industry’s own mindset.

Most people in the room, she noted, had been in the sector for a long time. Few outsiders join, and younger voices are rare. That can create a bubble where teams believe their problems are unique and that they already have the answers. This program, she said, helped burst that bubble by showing how other industries face similar challenges and how much there is to learn from them. She pushed back on comments like “that won’t work for us,” pointing to examples, from Decathlon to tires, where “unsexy” products still drove real innovation.

She also described her early skepticism about the idea of bringing competitors, customers, and suppliers together to talk about more than daily transactions. Within hours, she said, it was clear the value was the connections: honest conversations about ambitions and challenges, and the courage to share them. Content matters, she added, but the exchange among participants is what changes minds and creates opportunities.

Sylvie Layec, Senior Vice President Parts&Services, Sales&Marketing, Global, STELLANTIS Group took the baton and agreed. When she first heard the plan, she was excited but arrived thinking she was there mainly to get: whether marketing insights, solutions to apply back at work. Minutes into the session, she flipped her mindset to share. The real power, she argued, is not one connection but connectivity: many links across roles and regions that let the community create value together. Diversity in the room: sup-

pliers, customers, distributors, trading groups from many countries, was the key asset.

She described a group exercise that stuck with her. The team included different “risk profiles”: some gamblers, some wait-and-see, some very cautious. Back at Stellantis, she said, they built those perspectives into governance, so decisions no longer came only from the same people using the same process. That change, she told colleagues in a follow-up note, came directly from this program. Her takeaway became a rule of thumb: finding people who challenge and inspire you and spending time with them will change your work.

Both speakers offered quick examples that expanded their view. One was a Gen Z innovation leader from SNCF, whose approach to leadership and transformation led Sylvie to hire more Gen Z talent, with refreshing results. Another was a South African mining case: a team turned a basic pipe product into a service with “pay-per-uptime,” proving that even simple goods can anchor new business models.

They closed on a shared conclusion: the industry’s heritage and technology, even “200 years” of it, won’t carry companies forward if they keep working the same way. Progress will come from curiosity, better connections, and a true ecosystem mindset. In short, stop guarding knowledge, share it, learn fast, and grow together.

EVENING DEBRIEF

Loïc Sadoulet - INSEAD Professor

Loïc opened the evening debrief with energy and a simple ask: speak loudly, be honest, and share what really came up at each table.

What participants said (by theme)

1. Chinese vehicles, data, and parts: a gap we must close

Several voices argued that the independent aftermarket still lacks the basics to serve fast-growing Chinese car parc models: reliable cataloging, VIN/ application mapping, and clear sourcing paths. TecAlliance and others have tried, they said, but results in everyday workshops are still thin: “a car arrives, there’s no catalogue, no idea where to buy the parts.” The group called for a deadline-driven plan: if current efforts don’t deliver, form a broader industry alliance to build a workable tool by end-2026. Partnerships with OEMs already present in Europe (BYD was cited) could help with parts access, but the message was wider: treat this as a growth opportunity, not a talking point. Smart capital: shareholders who understand the upside will be needed.

2. From fear to opportunity

Another table pushed to stop framing EVs and new Chinese entrants as threats. The better lens is opportunity: plan for servicing these vehicles, invest in data (predictive, diagnostic), and keep pressure on right-to-repair so independents can compete fairly. “Don’t scare the children,” one participant joked, panic doesn’t build capability.

3. Work together on the vehicle’s second and third lives

Participants contrasted the OE-controlled first life with what happens after. Instead of OE and independents “killing each other” over the same 15% slice, they suggested collaborative standards for the used-vehicle phases: shared service levels and data so the end customer gets consistent quality. Not everyone will win, they warned, but those in the room can choose to be part of the winning wave by building solutions together.

4. Move from product-centric to customer-problem-centric

Even “unsexy” products can anchor services. The group cited cases discussed earlier, such as hoses, pipes, telematics, Decathlon’s service shift, Michelin’s outcomes, to show how firms can own customer problems instead of pushing boxes. That means looking past “this is our product, what can we do with it?” toward “what is the customer trying to achieve, and how do we remove friction?”

5. Reinvent before it’s too late—compete with China on value, not price. A cluster of comments linked back to the Decathlon case: continuous reinvention beats slow defense. Competing head-on with China on price is a dead end. The pivot is to partnerships with customers, richer experiences, and tangible service value. The tone shifted from “against China” to “with China”: learn, partner, and position where you can truly differentiate.

6. Talent, management, and Gen Z

One table focused on the “software of the business”: people. The industry skews older; it struggles to attract and keep younger talent. Pay matters, but purpose, learning, and real responsibility matter more. Many managers need help leading across generations: what motivates a 25-year-old is different from a 45-year-old. Building paths for Gen Z innovators is now part of competitiveness, not a side project.

Loïc’s close: use the place, use the diversity

Loïc wrapped with a short story about the setting. INSEAD, founded in 1957 as a peace project, sits in former NATO officers’ quarters in Fontainebleau: an intentional symbol that people from different nations can learn together and choose collaboration over conflict. The school’s value, he said, is diversity: not catching up with the colleague you saw three weeks ago, but bumping into unfamiliar perspectives and making use of them.

Throughline: urgency over comfort; collaboration over rivalry; services and data over commodity fights; and people—especially new voices—at the center of any lasting change.

THE WORLD IN FLUX: GEOPOLITICS AND STRATEGIC LEADERSHIP

Dominique Moïsi – Political Scientist and Author

The evening’s final speaker was Dominique Moïsi, a well-known French political scientist and co-founder of the French Institute of International Relations.

Dominique Moïsi argued that 2025 marks the end of the post-World War II order. He tied this shift to “two wars and an election”: Russia’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022; the October 7, 2023 attacks and the resulting Middle East war; and the re-election of Donald Trump in the United States. In his view, the U.S. has moved from a status-quo power during the Cold War to a revisionist power now: an actor changing the rules of the system it once upheld.

He added a fourth, symbolic moment: China’s September 3, 2025 military parade marking victory over Japan. Watching it, he felt it resembled Europe’s last grand royal gathering in 1910, which was followed by war four years later. The question, he said, is whether the “torch” has passed to Asia. He suggested that “Make America Great Again” may end up accelerating a different reality: “Make China Great Again.” Even with economic troubles at home, China projects renewed pride and power.

Dominique Moïsi then asked how America became a source of instability for democracies. He pointed to three turning points: 9/11, which shattered the sense of invulnerability; the 2007-2009 financial crisis, which deepened inequality and anger; and the rise of Donald Trump, whom he framed more as a symptom than a cause. He described Trump as unpredictable, surrounded by people with a clear project to reshape the state toward a more authoritarian model. Authoritarian regimes, he warned, see the current U.S. turmoil as proof that liberal democracy is failing, and they feel time is on their side. Despite the gloom, he noted pockets of resilience. India, he said, plays a stabilizing role: focused on economic consolidation rather than great-power rivalry. Europe, during the first hundred days of “Trump II,” began moving from adolescence to adulthood, forced to take more responsibility for security and democratic values. He also pointed to an “Asian

West”: countries like Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and increasingly Indonesia and the Philippines, as partners that share core interests with Europe.

On the Middle East, he referenced a plan made public “yesterday.” It could push Arab and Muslim leaders to share responsibility for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, while also requiring major movement from Israel. He doubted it would succeed, “unlikely” was his word, but called the alignment itself noteworthy.

Looking ahead, Moïsi outlined four scenarios:

1. A dangerous return to spheres of influence, where powers carve up the world by force, an echo of the path to World War I.

2. A new bipolarity, this time U.S.-China, with the added risk that nuclear weapons feel “normalized.”

3. A managed multipolarity with several major players: China, America, India, Russia, Europe, balancing one another.

4. Worst of all, chaos in the democratic camp, as populist regimes take power across the West. He noted worrying polling trends in France, the U.K., and Germany.

The good news, he said, lies more in science and medicine than in geopolitics. But even technology is double-edged. Artificial intelligence is transforming warfare: drones and, one day, robots, which can lower the cost of using force and tempt leaders into riskier choices. The same technology that may improve cancer care could also worsen geopolitics if left unchecked.

Moïsi closed with a stark image: the “white bread” era of relative stability is over; “dark bread” is coming. The task, he implied, is to face this new reality with clarity—and to act before the worst scenarios take hold.

DAY 2

October 1, 2025

REFLECTION SESSION

Loïc Sadoulet - INSEAD Professor

The morning opened with a simple question: what surprised you, what was confirmed, and what do you want to dig into next? The first answer set the tone: other industries face the same problems the aftermarket does. New digital rules, tighter regulation, and fast, low-cost Chinese competition aren’t unique to cars. We’re not alone, and there’s a lot to learn across sectors.

A side point landed hard: drop the phrase “best practice.” It can trigger the “not invented here” reflex. Better to say, “Here’s an interesting idea, could it fit our context?” The shift in words helps real cross-fertilization instead of defensiveness.

China came up often, with mixed feelings, pride for those who’ve built there, and a sense of threat from the speed and scale. The room challenged the old story that China only copies. Examples flowed: the high-speed rail build-out, 20-minute trips between major cities, and meeting new German safety standards others can’t. The takeaway: if you want to see the frontier in some domains, that’s where you go. The same goes for Saudi Arabia. Its recent push shows how storytelling and image change how a country (or brand) is perceived. Language and narrative matter, test and update both.

Another thread was people and trust. Several leaders admitted they need to double down on younger talent and understand why many don’t want to return to the office. One provocation: traditional bonus systems can kill trust: they imply, “I don’t trust you to do your best unless I pay after I see results.” A story from Cairo made the point: when a traveler asked a taxi driver for a receipt to get reimbursed, the driver laughed, “Your company trusts an Egyptian taxi driver more than you?” The group reflected on how some corporate routines undermine engagement without meaning to.

Strategy questions surfaced, too. With leasing terms stretching and fleets growing, who will the future customer be, individuals or fleets? What business models will win? The room agreed: don’t just get “ready” for the future, help shape it.

From the servitization session, one line stuck: “What customer problems do you want to own?” Strategy is about choices, including what to walk away from. If you add features and services that raise costs faster than customers’ willingness to pay, you destroy value, no matter the price you charge. Keep coming back to the value stick: raise willingness to pay, lower cost (without hurting value), and be clear about what you don’t do.

The discussion widened to global shifts. Participants described factory closures and the sense that the center of gravity is moving east. That can be a threat or opportunity. Either way, supply chains are changing: the old just-in-time ideal is giving way to just-incase resilience. That costs money, but it also creates options, and options have value in uncertain times.

The through-line of Day 1 was clear: learn across industries, update the story you tell about China and other fast-moving players, rebuild trust and engagement, choose the problems you’ll own, and treat resilience as a strategic asset, not an accident.

PARTNERING WITH CUSTOMERS FOR INNOVATION AND CHANGE

Nicolas Swetchine - Senior Vice President – Strategic Partners at Michelin

Who

he is and why Michelin hired him

His career started in telecoms across Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, and with many Chinese firms. He then moved into nuclear energy, where every question costs millions and “short term” means five years. After that came construction materials (Holcim), with large projects in Africa and Latin America. Three years ago, he joined Michelin to help launch a strategic partnerships program.

Why bring in an outsider who knows nothing about tires? Because Michelin is famous for doing everything in-house, even, until ~15 years ago, making its own office furniture. That culture built great engineering (visit the Ladoux R&D center and you’ll see PhDs from everywhere), but it also meant the company needed to open up as it moves beyond tires into “life-changing composites”: seals, belts, special polymers, medical applications, and more. He added some history: Michelin has reinvented itself many times, building planes in WWI, owning Citroën, and developing cars like the 2CV and the DS.

Alongside business, Nicolas Swetchine teaches sociology. His research asks why some partnerships work and others fail, how decisions get made, where

legitimacy comes from, and what creates trust. Why partnerships matter now

He sees four big forces pushing companies to partner:

• Data & AI: not just to “sell more tires,” but as a value source on its own.

• Sustainability: EVs and decarbonization are structural, even if politics wobbles.

• Geopolitics: global shocks will hit international groups like NEXUS and Michelin.

• Robotics/automation: especially in warehousing, changing how operations run.

Partnerships, he said, are about creating value faster than you can alone, and sharing that value fairly.

Stories: what works and what fails

• Japan (nuclear): Success. After years of careful relationship-building, his company and Japanese partners agreed a $3 billion investment in uranium enrichment capacity in France, backed by 20-year commitments. True partnership needs long horizons and tight alignment.

• EDF (France, nuclear): Failure. Despite deep ties, the relationship never rose above transactional. There was no shared mission, so real partnership could not form. Both sides later reorganized; the lesson stayed: without a joint vision, it won’t work.

• Holcim × Chinese constructors (Belt & Road): Success. Chinese firms build two-thirds of the world’s new infrastructure (less than half in mainland China). The shared goal was speed. A Nairobi-Mombasa project planned for four years was executed in 18 months. When the value is speed and capacity release, price haggling fades.

• Michelin × Ecolab (semi-public): Success. A cross-industry partnership on industrial water and energy (membranes, “digital steam,” site efficiency). It works because the firms share a technological credo, a similar culture and love of progress, even in different sectors.

How Michelin now selects partners

Be highly selective. At Michelin they score candidates on two axes:

1. Can we grow business together? (directly or by creating a new market effect)

2. Is the partner a leader in its field? (If you partner to innovate, don’t pick strugglers and hope.)

Also accept a hard truth: sometimes the partner is better than you in key areas. If you can’t handle that, don’t start. And agree early on how you’ll share value, waiting until the end is a recipe for conflict.

He advised capping true strategic partnerships, his “magic number” is ~12, so top management can review one per month and give each the attention it needs.

The “diamond” model for running partnerships

Skip the single “key account” gatekeeper. Use a “diamond” organization led by a Strategic Partner SVP who acts like an orchestra conductor, connecting both firms’ R&D, logistics, operations, marketing, public affairs, and more. The goal: develop business, co-innovate, and boost performance across functions, not just sales. This structure must survive leadership changes on either side, a partnership can’t depend on two CEOs liking each other.

What a partnership really builds

In sociological terms, a partnership is a new organization with three ingredients:

• a shared vision,

• a core team that likes working together, and

• accepted rules (governance, IP, data, value-sharing).

At the center is trust, and you have to work on it. Done well, partnerships also break internal silos; people forget the org chart and focus on the joint mission.

Practical convictions

• Be ambitious. Don’t aim small if you want innovation.

• Take time. Many attempts won’t make it. Better to stop early than force a bad fit.

• Spend time with partners. His motto: “Lose time with your business partner.” Curiosity pays: every cross-industry talk teaches you something about tech, organization, geopolitics, robotics, AI, or data.

He closed with a broader point. Trade does not magically prevent war, but commerce builds understanding. In a tense world, companies that partner across borders and sectors can still create value, and in a small way, help keep doors open.

VALUING FUTURE-PROOFNESS: A FINANCIAL FRAMEWORK

Dominique Jacquet - Professor at INSEAD

Dominique Jacquet, Adjunct Professor at INSEAD set out a practical view of corporate finance: it isn’t about clever formulas; it’s about helping the business make good choices and making sure cash is there when good ideas appear. Operations create value. Finance supports it, by keeping performance healthy over time and by securing liquidity.

The core idea: performance = beating the hurdle He started with a simple test. Invest 100 today and receive 120 in a year: good or bad? It depends on your hurdle rate (the cost of capital/WACC). If your hurdle is 7%, 120 beats 107 and creates value. If inflation or risk means the “market” demands more, 120 may be too low. The point: profit by itself isn’t performance. Performance is return compared with the hurdle you must clear.

Finance, he said, has two “top lines”:

• For operators: revenue (do customers value what we sell?).

• For finance: investment (are we putting money into assets that will beat the hurdle?).

Both matter, and both must connect. How investors think (and why it matters)? Money can go anywhere on the “big shelf” of the

capital markets: from safe government bonds to risky equities. Within a given risk bucket, money flows to the best expected return. If your industry returns 10% while others in the same risk class offer 15%, you will struggle to attract capital, even if you’re doing a good job internally. Less capital later means fewer factories, weaker quality, slower growth. Performance attracts funding, and funding sustains performance.

That is why companies promise a return (guidance) and then must deliver. Miss too often and trust erodes: refinancing gets harder, suppliers tighten terms and working capital needs to rise because people ask for cash up front.

WACC in one minute WACC blends the cost of equity and debt. Example: 50% equity expecting 10% plus 50% debt costing

4% after tax >> about 7% WACC. This is the minimum average return your invested capital must earn to be considered performing. The exact mix of debt/ equity is a strategy: more debt can look cheap but raises fragility, as Lafarge learned, going into the 2008 crisis highly leveraged. Rule of thumb: if business risk is high (innovation, acquisitions, volatile cash), keep the financial structure conservative.

Measure what matters: ROIC vs. ROS, EBIT vs. EBITDA

Investors finance capital, not revenue, so watch return on invested capital (ROIC/ROCE), not just margin. The cash engine and the performance engine use different gauges:

• EBIT pays investors (performance lens).

• EBITDA funds capex and working capital (liquidity lens). You need both. Don’t confuse an EBITDA story (cash) with an EBIT/ROIC story (value creation).

To connect operations with finance, Jacquet used the classic DuPont example: ROIC = (EBIT / Sales) × (Sales / Capital Employed) = margin × asset turnover.

Capital-intensive models (telecom, chemicals) must earn higher margins to compensate for low turnover. Asset-light or retail models can create strong ROIC with low margins but high turnover (think Walmart). There isn’t one right model, but only the combination that beats WACC.

Strategy choices seen through ROIC

1. Own assets or not?

Contrast McDonald’s (heavy real estate on balance sheet) with Starbucks (much lighter). Both can work. McDonald’s trades flexibility for control, Starbucks trades control for agility. The key is whether the chosen design still clears the hurdle.

2. Make or buy?

Outsourcing can lift asset turnover (less capex, lower working capital) and even improve margins if suppliers have economies of scale. But you may shift bargaining power and know-how to suppliers, changing the value chain and your long-run economics. Look beyond the first-year ROIC bump.

3. Price, volume, and customers

Passing inflation straight to customers can protect short-term margins but shrink volume and weaken loyalty (he discussed Unilever). Sometimes the better long-term move is to sacrifice margin now to keep customers and scale (Philip Morris’s famous price cut). Being listed (and widely held) makes these choices harder. Being protected (family or majority control) can make long-term bets easier to sustain.

4. Supply chain as a cash machine

When Walmart took working capital down by roughly a month of purchases, the cash unlocked could fund growth instead of buybacks. Reducing inventories and payables/receivables frictions strengthens the EBITDA >> cash bridge and gives you options: debt reduction, dividends/buybacks, or reinvestment. He urged prioritizing reinvestment if you have credible growth projects.

Options thinking: when losing money is rational

Sometimes a first project loses money on purpose: to learn, prove credibility, or open doors to bigger, profitable projects. Think of it as buying an option: pay a limited entry ticket now to keep the right, not the obligation, to scale later if conditions turn favorable. Options raise upside, limit downside, and are valuable in uncertainty. He used simple coin-flip examples to show why the right to withdraw changes the math: you focus on upside and avoid ruin. In high-uncertainty spaces (EV software, autonomy), design staged investments with stop/go gates.

What to remember (leader’s checklist)

• Beat the hurdle. Profit ≠ performance. Compare ROIC to WACC and quantify economic profit.

• Match risk buckets. If peers in your risk class offer more, capital will flow away. Earn the right to be funded.

• Mind structure. Don’t stack operational risk on financial risk. Keep flexibility.

• Use the two dials. Improve margin (price, mix, cost—but don’t starve future-creating costs like R&D) and improve turnover (asset-light choices, supply-chain speed).

• Run on cash and value. Manage EBITDA >> cash (working capital, capex timing) and EBIT/ROIC >> value. You need both engines.

• Design options. Stage investments, cap the downside, and keep the right to stop. In uncertainty, options beat all-in bets.

Jacquet’s message to non-financial leaders was encouraging: you don’t need fancy math. You need clear comparisons, honest risk choices, and a habit of asking, “Does this investment beat our hurdle, and if not now, does it buy us a real option for later?”

CASE STUDY: CHINA, ECAV AND NEW INVESTMENT MODELS

Hakan Dogu - Chairman Alagan.tech solutions

Hakan Doğu, Automotive Strategist began with a blunt read of the moment: if today’s car market feels chaotic, that’s because we’re living through a revolution, what he called ECAV: Electric, Connected, Autonomous, and (software-defined) Vehicle. In his words, the old rules of “Automotive 1.0/2.0” are ending, a new game is starting.

What’s changing in the car itself

• The car is turning into a “phone on wheels.” Software now defines the experience more than mechanics. Hakan teased “dinosaurs” like himself who dislike touchscreen gear selectors, his daughter, he noted, switches settings on a screen without a second thought. Voice will soon be the main interface, he argued, almost everything in the cabin will respond to spoken commands. He’s already replaced one admin role on his team with AI tools.

Implications for the aftermarket

• Fewer moving parts in EVs mean less classic maintenance (clutches, oil), but more electronics, sensors, and calibration work.

• Diagnostics and data access become existential: modern vehicles throw off camera/radar signals and error data that independents must read, calibrate, and monetize. That requires tools, partnerships, and training—far beyond the old “parts + labor” model.

The global market shock

• He painted a tough picture for Europe: new-car demand is down (from ~15M to ~12M units), German suppliers and OEMs are under pressure, and China producing ~1/3 of world’s output. He cited sharp share losses for European brands in China and warned of downsizing if sales don’t recover. In the U.S., he said, Tesla is the exception, Toyota/ Hyundai/Kia are holding up, and many others are struggling.

• On EV profitability, his claim was stark: “nobody makes money,” pointing to margin pressure at leaders and brutal price wars in China. Export pushes, he argued, are often a symptom of domestic overcapacity. His refrain: “Winter is coming”, expect bankruptcies and consolidation.

Speed of technology

• Tech cycles are too fast to wait. Today’s 350-km EV becomes 700-km, then 800-km: each year brings big jumps. Buy, learn, and adjust quickly, he urged, because products go obsolete faster than planning cycles.

Change the mindset (learn from China)

• Many Chinese players started outside autos (batteries, consumer electronics) and moved in aggressively. The West, he warned, often spends years debating while others ship. His advice: drop the arrogance, copy what works, and move.

How to invest: from VC “shopping” to building together

Hakan contrasted two models:

1. Classic corporate VC (“supermarket”)

You collect a fund, buy stakes in already-mature startups “on the shelf,” and hope value rises. You rarely shape the product, have little control, and risk paying high entry prices.

2. Corporate Venture Squad (his preferred model) Multiple established companies form a hands-on coalition with one or more startups to solve a specific, shared problem (e.g., remote EV diagnostics, ADAS calibration). Partners pilot together, co-design the MVP, and license the result to the network so it can scale fast across members. This lowers risk (you build what users need), speeds adoption, and keeps the tech aligned with aftermarket realities. He used a similar approach earlier in his career to co-develop solutions with six–seven firms at once.

Why this fits the aftermarket: the hardest part is not invention; it’s scaling into thousands of workshops. If network members get usage rights, scale becomes part of the plan—not an afterthought.

Concrete problem list (where to aim first)

• Remote/EV diagnostics (turn raw vehicle data into useful, billable insights).

• Camera/radar calibration (make it reliable and workshop-friendly).

• Battery intelligence (health, safety, second-life decisions).

• V2X/connectivity (tie vehicles, workshops, and supply into one flow).

He pushed the group to start with quick wins while also backing a few breakthrough bets.

FROM COMPLIANCE TO ADVANTAGE: SUSTAINABILITY AS STRATEGIC VALUE CREATION

Loïc Sadoulet - INSEAD Professor

Why this session

Loïc asked the group to step back from daily tasks and look at the big picture: where the world is going, what that means for our businesses, and how to realign people and resources fast enough to keep up. His method mixed discussion, short cases, and simple tools leaders can use on Monday morning.

Part 1 — Change the frame of thinking

A 2035 thought experiment. Teams imagined their company in 2035 under two extremes:

• best case: innovative, disruptive, and desirable.

• worst case: bankrupt and dismantled. Then they listed what actions and mindsets led to each path. The point wasn’t to predict the future. It was to surface the habits and choices that make or break a company.

Most strategies sound alike. Groups suggested familiar moves: go global, buy companies, add predictive maintenance, redesign the customer journey, diversify to new trends, partner more. Loïc’s challenge: your competitors will say the same things. What’s truly different about your plan?

The red-blue tension. Companies ride a curve: find product-market fit, grow fast, mature, then need reinvention. Early phases need fast, practical builders (“blue”); scale phases need process and

discipline (“red”). Mature firms are run by “red” people—yet reinvention requires “blue” energy. The trick is mutual respect and co-existence: today’s profits (red) must fund tomorrow’s bets (blue). Start reinventing while you’re still strong, not when cash is gone.

Kodak vs. Fuji (mindset matters). Kodak invented digital photography but hid it to protect film, someone else ate their lunch. Fuji reframed its know-how (protecting collagen from sun in film) into skincare. Lesson: define your business by your capabilities, not your current product.

Shift mindsets—customers’ and your own.

• People cling to old metaphors (the “save” icon still looks like a floppy disk). You must teach new value, not just ship new features.

• Decathlon got customers to rent ski gear (even clothes) by smart framing: “You already sleep on hotel sheets.” Education unlocked adoption.

• All Life insured HIV-positive people by coaching healthier behavior. Clients’ life expectancy rose, turning a “no-go” market into profit. That’s blue ocean thinking.

Create value so price matters less. On a Nairobi-Mombasa project, speeding delivery from four years to 18 months changed the whole conversation: the value of time dwarfed haggling on inputs. Price dropped out of the spotlight.

Data is the real product. A mining supplier earned most value not from hoses in a container, but from usage data that revealed what the mine truly needed. Likewise, SKF found that reman bearings cut CO₂ ~80% and the returned parts told them how products performed in the real world. Data improved operations and offerings.

Disruption-by-model, not just price. In 2012 Free Mobile slashed French phone bills from ~€120 to €18 by shifting where money is made; incumbents had to follow. Business models, not features, win markets.

Four lanes of innovation (modernize <--> transform; narrow <--> broad).

• Modernize, narrow: do the same thing, just better (e.g., robots in warehouses).

• Modernize, broad: mass personalization at scale (e.g., connected car routines).

• Transform, narrow: flip the model (e.g., Tesla planning robotaxi utilization).

• Transform, broad: build a new ecosystem (e.g., circular economy plays).

Know which lane you’re in, and why.

From bilateral deals to ecosystems. For big problems, act as one team with partners, win the work together, then share the value fairly. Ecosystems beat solo heroes.

Part 2 — Make agility and fairness real Strategic agility = two muscles.

1. See the change (new actors, tech, rules).

2. Move resources and bring people with you.

Reward those who create enterprise value, not budget holders who hoard. Teach CFOs to arbitrate on opportunity cost and portfolio returns, not only ROCE.

Build in the market, not in HQ. Don’t design the “next billion customers” strategy in a conference room. Go where the customers are, or bring them into the room.

Pick an innovation model that fits.

• Google 80/20: 80% core, 20% exploration. Clear objective, values (“life is in beta,” “launch and learn,” “focus on users”), a hard rule (“don’t be evil”), and permission to ask forgiveness, not permission. Bottom-up projects recruit peers’ 20% time to scale.

• Intel Labs: strict firewall: if you do normal Intel work in the Labs, you’re fired. Exploration stays pure. Different cultures, different guardrails, both valid.

Make the fence visible. When rules are fuzzy, people fear “random zaps” and stop taking risks. Define tolerable vs. non-tolerable risks and your risk appetite. Clear frames unlock initiative.

Invest like options in a storm. The more volatile the world, the more you should buy options (small bets with upside, staged by gates). Judge decisions by process and fit with risk limits, not only outcomes. Some good outcomes came from excess risk and shouldn’t be rewarded. Some failures were within bounds and shouldn’t be punished. Think portfolio, not single projects.

Fair-process leadership. People accept tough calls if the process feels fair:

• Engage them early (ideas, concerns).

• Explain the decision and trade-offs.

• Set expectations and reward execution (the behaviors we asked for), then measure and learn. If results fail, re-open the process, don’t blame and hide.

Be transparent about judgment. Most leaders decide fast, then justify. Use simple criteria sheets to show why you chose X over Y, so even those who disagree can see the logic.

Fix budgeting games. Annual targets set months in advance go stale by January. Tie big bonuses to them and you get sandbagging (“aim for 101, not 110, or next year they’ll raise it +30%”). Move to rolling forecasts, relative measures, and clear ratchet rules. Design honest incentives. Loïc’s “red button” thought experiment (press to double your salary, no one will know, it helps no one) shows how misaligned incentives corrode ethics. Build systems where what pays is what creates value.

What leaders should take away

• Change the frame: name the 2035 win/lose stories and the behaviors that drive each.

• Balance red & blue: protect today’s cash and fund tomorrow’s bets at the same time.

• Compete on value: educate customers, reshape offers, and make price smaller in the conversation.

• Build ecosystems: win together and split value fairly.

• Make rules clear: define risk limits, choose an innovation model, and reward execution.

• Run a portfolio: stage bets, judge process, and keep moving resources to the best opportunity cost.

Loïc’s core message: the world won’t slow down. Our only real edge is how quickly we learn, how clearly we decide, and how fairly we bring people with us.

DAY 3

October 2, 2025

DIGITAL & AI - WHAT EXECUTIVES NEED TO KNOW

Theodoros Evgeniou - Professor at INSEAD

Theodoros Evgeniou, Professor at INSEAD opened with brief credentials: MIT-trained in machine learning, work with the OECD, and two AI ventures (one in trust & safety, one in AI strategy). Before sharing views, he asked what excited and worried people about AI. Hands went up for both. That split, hope and fear, framed the hour.

The big question: who wins with AI?

To explain uneven outcomes, he used a simple story from the early internet: Dell vs. Compaq. Dell’s model fit online sales: Compaq’s did not, so one rose and the other fell. His challenge: what is the AI-era equivalent at the level of individuals, companies, and countries? Which traits and operating models are “AI-friendly,” and which are not?

He also gave a macro image: imagine ants (firms) riding monkeys (industries) on dogs (countries) on an elephant (the system, central banks, political cul-

ture). Ants can jump, the elephant still decides most of the movement. Leaders must notice the elephant they’re riding and, if needed, help change the system, not just optimize the ant.

What makes AI different

Unlike earlier tech, AI is a “mental technology.” It interacts with our minds: it can persuade at scale and even shape memory, so trust & safety becomes a core business function, not just for platforms. He urged firms in any industry to plan for a VP of AI Trust & Safety role.

On capability, he argued the trajectory points to systems that can match, or exceed, human experts (“Einstein and then super-Einstein”). He pointed to recent scientific breakthroughs credited to AI teams as early signs of that future.

A working map for companies and countries

Most “first-round” AI strategies, national or corporate, look alike:

• Enablers: data (quality/governance), talent, and infrastructure.

• Use cases: forecasting, supply chain, customer support, R&D, etc.

• Focus domains: where each country or company places its bets.

• Governance: rules, risk, and oversight. That’s necessary but not sufficient. In later rounds, leaders must redesign systems, not just bolt AI onto old processes: transport (far fewer privately owned cars; autonomy), healthcare (AI-led intake, tests, diagnosis, logistics), education, defense, and more. New tech + old organization, he warned, yields only an “Expensive Old Organization.” (His shorthand: NT + OO = EOO.)

Education: from answers to inquiry

Theos pushed back on the fear that AI makes students lazy. The fix is new homework, not banning tools. Yesterday’s assignment (“memorize one narrative”) became, in the Google era, “compare multiple sources.” In the AI era, it should be “have the AI generate competing views, then you compare, critique, and debate.” AI can act as a Socratic tutor that asks questions and stretches thinking. The real aim is curiosity.

The “curiosity dividend”

His first conjecture: curious people and open cultures get the most from AI. Work with smarter partners and tools and you get smarter; AI amplifies that loop. The task for leaders is to seed curiosity, in hiring, training, and incentives, so more people climb that curve.

Ethics, values, and products

He dislikes vague “AI ethics” debates that become power games. Inside a company, treat values as product features: how polite should an autonomous car drive in Paris vs. Munich? How should privacy,

safety, and fairness show up in decisions? Decide deliberately, test with users, and make those choices visible in AI governance.

Robotics: everything gets a brain

He asked the room to look around: almost nothing in it adapts to us. In ten years, he predicted, “dumb” objects become robots: things with sensors, chips, and feedback. Meeting rooms, whiteboards, chairs, logistics gear: all instrumented, all responsive. We’re at day zero.

Inequality, jobs, and firm design

He shared research suggesting many jobs have some tasks that can be automated, a few have many, and very few can be automated end-to-end. Output per person will jump; the hard part is the transition. His forecast: inequality will likely increase between people who can work with AI and those who can’t. The counterweights are education, upskilling, and business models that raise revenue per employee by pairing humans with “AI co-workers.” Expect more, smaller firms solving specific problems with tiny teams plus AI, rather than only a few giant employers.

Different national playbooks

Markets push U.S. tech toward ad-driven uses. China’s state-led model points AI at industry, health, and education. He didn’t declare a winner but urged executives to see the systems logic behind each approach, and to choose partners and geographies accordingly.

Why this matters beyond business

The long arc of history, the rise in living standards after the scientific and industrial revolutions, came from knowledge turned into tools. If AI helps produce far more science, faster, it could trigger another step change. That promise sits beside risks, from persuasion to geopolitics, so governance will matter. But his closing note was unmistakably optimistic: these are the most exciting, demanding years to build with AI, provided we redesign our organizations, reward curiosity, and keep people in the loop where it counts.

MONETIZE,

MOBILIZE, MAXIMIZE: HOW UTILITY TOKENS UNLOCK THE TRUE POWER OF YOUR COMMUNITY

Dom Einhorn - Founder Intelligent Games LLC

Dom Einhorn, Founder Intelligent Games LLC began with a clear focus: utility tokens and how they can help a fragmented industry like the automotive aftermarket to work together. He runs an incubator-accelerator dedicated to these tokens and a quiz platform (“Intelligent Games”) that uses them to drive learning and engagement. His core idea is a simple flywheel he calls “Triple-M”: Monetize, Mobilize, Maximize, where contributions are recognized, people are mobilized by rewards, and the value created is maximized and recycled across the community.

What a utility token is—and isn’t

Dom Einhorn placed tokens on a spectrum: security tokens (regulated like stocks and bonds), meme tokens (largely unregulated speculation), and utility tokens (the middle ground with real, usable benefits). The closest analogy is loyalty points, airline miles or store rewards, but on a blockchain: every transaction is recorded, ownership is clear, and, unlike points, the token can trade on an exchange and carry a market cap.

Why this matters: tokens are portable and global (your wallet lives on your phone or laptop), they remove borders to participation, and they align incentives: when the ecosystem succeeds, everyone holds the token benefits. In his view, that makes collaboration more attractive than rivalry.

Where tokens fit the aftermarket

Einhorn suggested using tokens to reward the behaviors the industry wants more of:

• Data sharing: distributors and garages earn tokens for SKU-level sales/usage data, improving forecasting and availability.

• Training & certification: technicians earn tokens for completing modules; they can spend them on tool discounts or badges that attract business.

• Referrals & onboarding: suppliers or garages that bring in new partners earn tokens: growth becomes community-driven.

• Sustainable contributions: using remanufactured/recycled parts can earn “sustainability” tokens redeemable for discounts or visibility.

His rule of thumb: “what you recognize is what you grow.” Tokens turn contributions into financial and social capital.

“Who finances the tokens?”

First you mint the token (easier today than a few years ago), then you list it on a decentralized exchange (e.g., Raydium/Orca for Solana) or a centralized exchange (e.g., Binance, Coinbase). Some ecosystems start private, but he argued an open listing often creates more value and reach, he even floated a sector-wide aftermarket token (e.g., “AFTR”) as a proxy for the whole community.

Designing the “economy” around the token

Tokenomics is choice-driven: decide allocations (team, engineers, community), assign governance rights (holders vote on priorities like sustainability projects), and create tiered benefits (more tokens unlock faster service or higher directory placement). In short, “gamify loyalty, not just purchase volume.” Done well, tokens turn users into stakeholders.

Lessons from platforms

Using Wikipedia as an analogy, Einhorn contrasted top-down moderation with a tokenized, bottom-up model where contributions earn status and value, and the community, rather than a single gatekeeper,

arbitrates disputes. The goal: reduce unproductive conflict and reward high-quality contribution.

A

live case: Masters of Trivia

His own quiz community (~250,000 users) introduced a token at $0.02. About six months later it traded near $1.20, implying a community market cap of around $600 million. He highlighted the pattern: where there is an active community and clear utility (rewards, recognition, access, leaderboards), engagement deepens and the token can take on a life of its own. Without a community, he warned, launching a token is far harder.

Beyond games: tokenization everywhere

Einhorn said other sectors, such as oil & gas, mining, insurance, finance, are adopting tokens to cut friction and add transparency. He expects stocks, bonds, and payments to move on-chain, with near-instant settlement and much lower fees (he cited a few cents per transfer) and fewer intermediaries. His claim: this can even reduce corruption by removing opaque middle steps. The broader tech pattern, he argued, is familiar: what begins with complex becomes simple and cheap as tools mature.

The takeaway for this community

• Use tokens to reward the actions that grow shared value.

• Open participation so more stakeholders can contribute and benefit.

• Treat governance as a product feature: let holders help set priorities.

• Start with concrete use cases (data, training, referrals, circularity), then scale.

In Einhorn’s words, a well-designed token makes people “grow the pie, not just their slice.” Mechanics will keep getting easier. What matters most is the philosophy, from isolated players to an autonomous, aligned community.

CLOSING SESSION

Loïc Sadoulet - INSEAD Professor

Loïc Sadoulet, INSEAD Professor, closed the program by returning to a simple idea: the world is changing faster than organizations are learning. Years ago, he said, learning could keep up with change. Not anymore. We can’t slow the world down, so the only real option is to speed up how fast we learn, as people, teams, and companies.

Experiments

where the return is

learning

He urged the group to stop searching for a single “silver bullet” for AI or any new technology. Nobody knows which use case will win. The answer is to launch many small experiments across the business. Don’t judge them only by P&L, judge them by return on learning. Do they grow the company’s capacity to adapt? Within that mindset, even a “failed” pilot can pay off if it raises resilience and shortens the next learning cycle.

A survival metaphor: small, fast, and diverse

Borrowing an image from Singularity University, Loïc compared today’s tech shock to the meteorite that ended the dinosaurs. Most life forms died, the survivors were the small, flexible ones with diverse ways to feed and move. In business terms, diversity is an asset of people, skills, ideas, and options. The more varied your “nutrition,” the better your chances to adjust when the environment flips.

Mindset changes outcomes

Loïc cited work by Harvard’s Ellen Langer showing how mindset can affect real-world results, from aging studies to simple healing experiments with clocks set

faster or slower. His takeaway: stop beating yourself up for not knowing. What matters is staying curious and accelerating learning. Instead of chasing confirming evidence (“trees are green”), look longer and notice the many shades: yellow, brown, pale green. Train your eyes and teams to see differences, not just one answer.

“It depends”: reject closed answers

School taught many of us that every question has one correct answer. In reality, context matters. Even “1 + 1” depends on the base (two in base 10, different in base 2) or the problem (one pile of sand plus one pile becomes…still one pile). Leaders should ask how people reached an answer, not only what the answer is. That habit keeps learning alive.

Keep the conversation going

He invited participants to share stories of what they try next. His hope: these 2½ days are a beginning, not an end. “Increase the rate of learning,” he said, and handed the very last word to Gaël.

FAREWELL AND CLOSING WORDS

Gaël Escribe - CEO, NEXUS Automotive International

Gaël Escribe, NEXUS’ CEO closed by thanking the group for spending 2½ days together in Fontainebleau and for staying present, “not hiding behind screens.”

Experiments where the return is learning

Gaël then offered his own takeaways. The program is now rooted: next year brings three sessions, one again in Fontainebleau, one in Singapore for Asian members and manufacturers, and one in Abu Dhabi for N-1 leaders (direct reports), with a slightly different design. Two themes stood out across all talks and debates: China and AI. China came up in every discussion. NEXUS, he said, needs a clear China strategy, not just scattered actions. On AI, after the morning’s session, he wanted an AI plan shared with all employees by December, a practical roadmap that grows over time. Other topics that mattered were partnerships, market shifts, leadership, but China and AI will shape the near future most.

He reminded participants why they came: not for a technical class on brakes or filters, but to step outside the daily ecosystem, refresh perspective, and collect a few key ideas they could each digest in their own way. Helpful for budget work now and for building better companies later.

Finally, he kept the tone light with a “final exam” joke: maybe it’s champagne, maybe it’s a customer survey, and then presented participants with certificates. It was a friendly proof for bosses, shareholders, or HR that they had chosen to invest 2½ days at INSEAD, learning fast together.

COMMITTED TOGETHER. THE FUTURE IS OURS.

COMMITTED TOGETHER. FUTURE OURS.