Luca de Meo officially arrives in one of the hottest seats in fashion on Sept. 15, charged with engineering a speedy turnaround for ailing French luxury group Kering, which has been dragged down by steep declines at its star brand Gucci, and a bulging debt load.He’s going to hit the ground running,” predicted one source familiar with the former Renault Group executive, who has already begun his crash course in fashion and luxury.

It is understood de Meo has already visited many of Kering’s brands, which stretch from smaller ones like Brioni to such marquee houses as Saint Laurent, Balenciaga and Bottega Veneta.

He has been spotted several times at Kering’s headquarters on the Rue de Sèvres in Paris, and broke bread with the executive committee, which includes several brand chief executive officers, the chief financial officer and the general secretary.

De Meo is expected to make his public debut at the Gucci presentation on Sept. 23 during Milan Fashion Week.

“He’s like a sponge, he learns very quickly,” another source said of de Meo, describing him as a man of few words and swift execution, often giving himself only 100 days when he enters a new company to devise an action plan. “He goes quickly, and listens to a lot of people.”

De Meo, 58, spent five years leading Renault and boasts a total of 30 years in the automobile industry at brands including Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Toyota, Volkswagen and Seat.

Another top luxury executive who has spent time with de Meo described him as a product-minded, hands-on developer with a seductive personality, good taste and a penchant for expensive watches.

“His first project will be to work on the cash situation — and then build the team,” the executive opined.

De Meo already has fashion friends in high places, including Diego Della Valle of Tod’s Group and Pietro Beccari, chairman and CEO of Louis Vuitton, with whom he frequently plays padel, multiple sources said.

One luxury analyst, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said de Meo’s steepest learning curves will be retail — the lifeblood of luxury brands, which control the lion’s share of their own distribution — interfacing with designers, and getting to grips with fashion’s complex marketing and media ecosystem.

Since de Meo’s appointment as CEO of Kering was revealed last June, taking over the role from François-Henri Pinault, who becomes chairman, legions of Kering employees have been binge-watching the French-language series “Anatomie d’un come-back,” (“Anatomy of a comeback,” in English), which details how the Italian executive led a dramatic turnaround at Renault.

In the show, de Meo comes off as a driven, detail-oriented and sometimes blunt executive, never sugar-coating criticism. The series recounts how he leveraged technology, nostalgia and design to dramatically improve Renault’s fortunes, also leading the carmaker into electric, planet-friendly vehicles, which should mesh well with Kering’s strong sustainability ethos.

De Meo is poised to receive a sign-on bonus of 20 million euros, largely to compensate him for long-term variable remuneration elements he relinquished when he exited Renault Group, according to documentation about Kering’s Sept. 9 board meeting, where de Meo’s appointment will be ratified.

As CEO of Kering, he is also to receive a fixed annual salary of 2.2 million euros in 2025, annual variable remuneration of 1.21 million euros, plus share options in the long term based on various performance targets.

For 2026, the Kering board is proposing annual fixed remuneration of 4.84 million euros and capped at 6.6 million in the event of outperformance.

Luca Sola, luxury analyst at Bernstein, suggested in a recent research note that de Meo must curb Kering‘s elevated debt levels, streamline top management, and negotiate a larger “equity for Valentino” deal with Mayhoola, the Qatar-based group that sold a 30 percent stake to Kering two years ago. The French has an option to buy 100 percent of Valentino’s capital by 2028, while Mayhoola could become a shareholder in Kering.

According to Bernstein, Kering’s net debt rose from 200 million euros in 2021 to about 10.5 billion euros at the end of 2024 as the French group embarked on a major M&A and capex spree, buying Creed, Maui Jim and prime chunks of real estate.

At the time of de Meo’s appointment, Pinault, who has held the CEO title since 2005 and navigated the family-controlled conglomerate through multiple transformations, told analysts the Italian automotive specialist “will bring new ways of looking at things.”

Asked if de Meo would maintain the current management structure, forged in 2023 when Kering promoted Saint Laurent CEO Francesca Bellettini to deputy CEO in charge of brand development, and CFO Jean-Marc Duplaix to deputy CEO and chief operating officer, Pinault acknowledged de Meo does not know the fashion industry “so he will need strong support and strong expertise around him, and we have that inside the group, starting with Jean-Marc and Francesca.”

However, he stressed de Meo will be a fully fledged CEO: “I will be fully involved in the strategic orientation of the group as chairman…but I will not step in and short-circuit the CEO in his prerogatives regarding the priorities, the organization or the key appointments of the group.”

“Things need to be shaken up,” said one luxury analyst, lamenting the “friends and family” approach of recent management appointments, and a general “dilution of responsibility” at Kering that is distinct from its more buttoned-up luxury rival LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton.

On the plus side, “the brand portfolio is fantastic,” and de Meo is sure to instill more rational approaches, and a sense of urgency, the analyst added.