Christian Leysen

Chairman of AXE Group of companies
(Ahlers - Xylos - AXE Investments)

Born August 4th, 1954 in Antwerp.
Commercial engineer - Masters’ degree in Law (Brussels University, 1976).

He started his career in 1976 with Arthur Andersen & Co., the international audit and consulting company. In 1981 he joined GB Inno BM, the largest Belgian retail group, where he was in charge of the Maxi division’s logistics and organisation.

In 1984, he founded Xylos, an information technology service provider and developed it into a company employing more than 100 people in offices in Antwerp, Brussels and Moscow.
In 1989 he took over daily management of Ahlers, an Antwerp-based shipping company and made it a logistical and maritime service provider with own offices in France, Russia, the Baltic States and Asia.

In 1994, he brought Ahlers back into private ownership through a buy-out operation of Stinnes AG (Mülheim) and became Chairman of the Board.

Beside its activities in transportation and information technology, the AXE Group is also active as an investor via AXE Investments.

Christian Leysen is a member of the board of KBC Banking & Insurance Group, Agfa-Gevaert and the Belgian Post Group. He is Chairman of the University of Antwerp Management School (UAMS). He is a founding member and was the first chairman of ADM (a cluster of about 100 IT related companies) and of the Belgian Enterprise Network for Social Cohesion (actually “Business & Society”).

November 2006