Fanny Letier: The COVID-19 crisis has just begun, its length and magnitude are uncertain and the outcome is unclear.

Fanny Letier, co-founder of GENEO Capital Entrepreneur, who participated in an exclusive workshop for investors organised by LPEA is sharing her insights on COVID-19 crisis measures with the public.

As any crisis, it will accelerate market transformation and competition landscape. All companies will be affected, but there will be (relative) winners and losers. Resilience will depend on sectoral exposure, relative competitiveness prior to the crisis, but also and more importantly the ability of managements to take appropriate measures rapidly. In the first weeks following the shock, leadership is instrumental not only to implement contingency plans but also to keep the teams engaged, communicate properly with suppliers, clients and financial partners and take the first decisions on capacity optimisation and cash management – to gain time and delay the pressure, and be able to work properly on recovery scenarios and action plans. The marathon has only started.

Besides, this crisis is different from the 2008 crisis : it is not a liquidity crisis, it is a societal crisis. Life and death are at stake. Many on-going societal trends (e.g. digitalization, strengthening human capital…) will accelerate ; others (e.g. globalization) may reverse.Winners will be companies with strong corporate culture, agile organisations with an ability to innovate and help their clients during the crisis and/or companies with a strong and efficient governance able to help them anticipate societal transformations that will drive the market tomorrow. As investors and business partners, it is our responsibility to help our portfolio companies to articulate short term actions, medium term action plans and long term vision.