Patrick Espasa, former General Director of Auchan Romania, takes over a global position | Progresiv

Patrick Espasa, the manager who led Auchan Romania between 2009 and 2014, quit the General Director position within Auchan Retail France for that of Director of International Partnership within the Group.

With over 40 years of experience at Auchan, Patrick Espasa will coordinate the international partnership department at the group level, such a joint venture being that with Alibaba on the Chinese market.

The manager has been at the head of Auchan Retail Fract in recent years and has previously been in charge of the affairs of the French retailer on the Italian and Romanian markets. Espasa will be replaced by Ali Khosrovi, a manager who joined Auchan in 1993, and gradually climbed from the position of aisle manager to Human Resources Director, General Manager of Immochan France. Khosrovi was named at the top of Auchan Retail France after a first semester in which sales did not rise to expectations - a 1.8% decline in turnover and a 30% fall in profit over the same period of the previous year.

Auchan is one of the most important players in the global retail market, operating 3,715 stores at group level and a turnover of 51.7 billion euros in 2016.