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François M. de Visscher
 François
M. de Visscher is a Managing Director of Source Companies, LLC.
He is also a Co-Chairman of Business Growth Alliance, LLC., and
also the Founder and President of de Visscher & Co. headquartered
in Greenwich Connecticut. Mr. de Visscher is a pioneer in the field
of financial advice to family companies and family offices. A native
of Belgium, Mr. de Visscher has been an active advisor to business
owning families for over twenty years, mostly in the United States,
Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Latin America. In 1990, Mr.
de Visscher founded de Visscher & Co., one of the world’s
leading independent financial consulting and investment banking
firms for family and closely-held companies. Over the last 15 years,
he and his team have advised over 250 family companies and family
offices worldwide on issues of liquidity for shareholders or capital
needs of their business.
Prior to opening his own firm he was a partner at
Smith Barney, where he founded and ran Wall Street's first Family
Business Group. In 1998, Mr. de Visscher co-founded “Family
Capital Growth Partners”, a private equity fund focused on
making minority and majority equity investments in family-owned
and closely held companies.
Mr. de Visscher is a family director and shareholder
of his own family’s global enterprise, N.V. Bekaert S.A. Headquartered
in Belgium, Bekaert was founded by his great grandfather in 1880.
Today, the Bekaert Group has sales of $4.0 Billion in over 100 countries
manufacturing and marketing a wide variety of steel wire and related
products. Mr. de Visscher is also a director of the family’s
Holding Company, Bekaert A.K.
Mr. de Visscher is a partner, investor or director
of several private corporations including Olympia Chimneys, Epic
Brands in the U.K., Ambridge Corp. in Colombia, J.H. Whitney Pan
Asian Fund, Arrow Capital Advisors, LLC and Legacy Business
Governance, LLC in the U.S. In 2006, he was asked
by the Consul General of Belgium in New York to serve as President
of Friends of Belgium in New York.
Mr. de Visscher is a past president of the Family
Firm Institute, current Chairman of the European Family Office Conference,
and a contributor to many publications, including The Wall Street
Journal, LA Times, NY Times and many others. He
is a full-time contributing editor of Family Business Magazine.
Mr. de Visscher is the recipient of the ‘Richard Beckhart Award”
from the Family Firm Institute in Boston, recognizing his many valuable
contributions to the Field of Family Businesses.
Mr. de Visscher is a Certified Public Accountant and
a member of the American Institute of CPA’s. Mr. de Visscher
holds a Bachelor of Economics honors degree from Université
Catholique de Louvain (Belgium) and MBA from Rutgers University.
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