Brad Jacobs, the billionaire at the head of the American group, is no stranger to France. He is behind the meteoric success of XPO Logistics, where he acquired a stake in 2011. Four years later, XPO acquired Lyon-based Norbert Dentressangle.

Each of these transactions had been perfectly executed, at the bottom of the cycle, just before the economy recovered. Did Jacobs see a similar pattern at Rexel in the current slump - particularly in the construction sector?

Cevian acquired a stake in the Porte d'Asnières-based group seven years ago. At the time, the investment raised a few questions, not least because Rexel seemed to be struggling to shake off a painful stagnation in sales and profits.

Things have changed radically since the arrival at the helm of Guillaume Texier - a Saint-Gobain defector - in September 2021. Under his leadership, Rexel took advantage of the pandemic to make a series of daring acquisitions, including Canadian Wesco and American Mayer.

A more or less complete change of style, but the recipe worked, with clear gains in sales, margins and profitability. Most impressive of all was the return on equity, which more than tripled in three years, without any increase in financial leverage.

With a well-diversified portfolio of customers and activities, and 43% of its sales in North America, Rexel now seems perfectly positioned to pursue its strategy of consolidation, including in the United States. to pursue its consolidation strategy, including new markets such as data centers and power grid renovation.

However, its remarkable progress had not yet been rewarded by the market, since Rexel's enterprise value, as a multiple of operating profit, was at EUR23 per share, well within its ten-year average.

QXO's EUR28 offer would have represented a decent premium for a group whose destiny had eluded it, and which would have liked to put it back in the hands of a well-informed industrialist. However, if Rexel has proved one thing in recent years, it is that it lacks neither ambition nor the talent to realize it.

In this context, Jacobs' offer, while it has the merit of highlighting recent progress, is far from a panacea.