Michael Peters (born 1971 in

Flensburg Flensburg (; Danish language, Danish and ; ; ) is an independent city, independent town in the far north of the Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein. After Kiel and Lübeck, it is the third-largest city in Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg's ...

West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...

) is a Franco-German

media executive A media proprietor, also called a media executive, media mogul, media tycoon, or press baron is an entrepreneur who controls any means of public or commercial mass media, through the personal ownership or holding of a dominant position within a ...

who served as chief executive officer (CEO) of

Euronews Euronews (stylised in lowercase) is a pan-European television news broadcasting, news network, headquartered in Lyon, France. It is a provider of livestreamed news, which can be viewed in Europe and North Africa via satellite, and in most of the ...

from 2011 to 2021.

Early life and education

Peters is the son of a French mother who worked as a teacher and a German father who served in the German airforce. He earned a

Master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional prac ...

Financial Engineering Financial engineering is a multidisciplinary field involving financial theory, methods of engineering, tools of mathematics and the practice of programming. It has also been defined as the application of technical methods, especially from mathe ...

from EM Lyon business school in 1995.

Career

Peters started his professional career at auditing firm

Arthur Andersen Arthur Andersen LLP was an American accounting firm based in Chicago that provided auditing, tax advising, consulting and other professional services to large corporations. By 2001, it had become one of the world's largest multinational corpo ...

in Lyon. He worked for the company from 1995 to 1998. Peters then joined

as a finance manager in 1998. He was promoted to

chief financial officer A chief financial officer (CFO) is an officer of a company or organization who is assigned the primary responsibility for making decisions for the company for projects and its finances; i.a.: financial planning, management of financial risks, ...

in 2000 and was named Euronews' Deputy Managing Director in December 2003. From May 2005 to December 2008, Peters held the position as managing director of Euronews, before being appointed managing director of the executive board of Euronews SA in December 2008. In December 2011, he became Euronews' executive chairman of the board. During his tenure, Media Globe Networks, managed by

Naguib Sawiris Naguib Onsi Sawiris ( ; ; born 15 June 1954) is an Egyptian businessman. Sawiris is chairman of Weather Investments's parent company, and the former chairman and CEO of Orascom Telecom Holding and Orascom Investment Holding S.A.E. Early li ...

, became the Euronews majority owner in July 2015. In October 2015, Euronews opened its new headquarters in Lyon, and introduced the Euronews Next digital initiative aimed at reaching younger audiences. Peters, together with journalist Stephen Smith, started developing the Euronews subsidiary

Africanews Africanews (styled as africanews) is a 24/7 pan-African multilingual news network located in Lyon, France, previously headquartered in Pointe-Noire, Republic of the Congo. The news channel began broadcasting online, and via TV and satellite on ...

in 2013. He was appointed president of Africanews SASU on its foundation in 2014 or 2015, leading the network through its digital launch on 4 January 2016 and jointly serving as its CEO. Peters left his position as chairman of the Euronews executive board in December 2021 and was appointed Euronews' chairman of the board of directors. Peters held this position until December 2022. He became the CEO of the company BusiNext, again working alongside Naguib Sawiris.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Peters, Michael 1971 births Emlyon Business School alumni Living people French media executives