Title: When the board of directors is confronted by activist shareholders: the case of Danone Group

Authors: Ivan Cuesta; Dominique Jacquet; Jordi Diaz

Addresses: École des Ponts Business School, Leonard Campus: 6 Pl. du Colonel Bourgoin, 75012 Paris, France; EADA Business School, C/ d'Aragó, 204, L'Eixample, 08011 Barcelona, Spain ' École des Ponts Paris Tech, Cité Descartes, 8 Av. Blaise Pascal, 77420 Champs-sur-Marne, France; EADA Business School, C/ d'Aragó, 204, L'Eixample, 08011 Barcelona, Spain ' C/ d'Aragó, 204, L'Eixample, 08011 Barcelona, Spain

Abstract: A firm's board of directors is considered an essential element of corporate governance. Its objective is to reduce agency costs, consequent to the separation of ownership and control (Gordon, 2006). Agency issues in corporate governance increase interest for activist events (Brav et al., 2008; Zhu, 2013; Fos, 2017). Danone, with four activist shareholders events between 2012 and 2021, might have faced agency issues that provoked these events. The purpose of this article is to identify any agency issue during this period and to evaluate to which extent it could have been a trigger for activism.

Keywords: Danone; corporate governance; board of directors; activist shareholder; independent director.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTCS.2025.145346

International Journal of Teaching and Case Studies, 2025 Vol.15 No.2, pp.134 - 156

Received: 22 Feb 2024
Accepted: 01 Apr 2024
Published online: 31 Mar 2025 *

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