Loïc Descamps - Founder & Senior Executive Advisor

About Loïc

Former CEO, COO, Deputy CEO, Loïc Descamps is a senior executive advisor and operating leader with more than 30 years of professional experience and over 20 years in leadership roles across Africa and Europe.

Biography

Loïc's career spans telecommunications, banking, financial inclusion, energy access, technology, services and entrepreneurship. He has led growth, transformation, turnaround and business-building assignments while working with boards, investors, regulators, international partners and management teams.

Experience

LD Transform's Foundation

He founded LD Transform to bring the judgment and accountability of an experienced operator to organisations facing critical market-entry, growth and performance challenges.

Track record

Banking

Led the branch generating half the revenue of a leading African bank, with more than 300 staff. Revenue grown from approximately €23M to €45M, net margin from 9.6% to 12.7%.

Energy access

Scaled an investor-backed off-grid energy company from approximately 1,000 to 75,000 customers, building the commercial, operational, governance and risk-management foundations required for institutional growth.

Technology turnaround

Regional telecommunications

Led a turnaround after several years of decline, returning the business from a negative net margin to profitability while delivering significant revenue growth.

Helped deliver strong revenue and profitability growth at a major Southern African telecommunications operator.

Geographic experience

Loïc brings particular depth in Francophone Central Africa, complemented by executive experience in Anglophone Africa—based in Botswana with responsibility across Southern African markets, and on assignment in Tanzania—as well as a strong understanding of European corporate environments.

He works in English and French.

How Loïc Works

• Works back to the root cause through facts and questions, before proposing anything.

• Direct, pragmatic and evidence-based.

• Comfortable from boardroom strategy to field execution.

• Focused on the few priorities capable of changing performance.

• Prepared to challenge assumptions while respecting local realities.

• Committed to strengthening teams rather than creating dependency.

”I had the immense privilege of working under Loïc Descamps's leadership for six years. As CEO, Loïc is an exceptional leader whose impact on the company and on my own professional development has been considerable.

Loïc has remarkable strategic vision, able to navigate complex environments and to set clear, ambitious objectives for the business.”

- Ludovic Mpah — Senior Manager, Finance & Accounting, reported to Loïc Descamps for six years, 2025

Translated from French.

”I had the privilege of working with Loïc Descamps. An inspiring, visionary and pragmatic leader, he knows how to rally his teams around clear and ambitious objectives. His commitment to energy access in Africa is remarkable.”

- Guy Noutam — Operations Director, worked under Loïc Descamps's leadership, 2025

Translated from French.

”Loïc is one of those rare executives who also serves as an inspiring mentor for his staff. I had an opportunity to work directly with him during his tenure as Group General Manager Commercial at BTC. […]

He is always exhibiting sound maturity and excellent leadership skills, very focused, and carries out his duties with great enthusiasm and high professionalism. He believes in carrying the team along in meeting his business objectives.”

- Fundie Mongwato — SME/SoHo Sales Manager at Orange, worked with Loïc Descamps at Botswana Telecommunications, 2013

”Loïc masters a powerful combination of management and communication skills. Objective-oriented, he also has a synthetic mind and the ability to always establish a clear vision out of difficult situations.”

- Dimitri Lederer — Professor, Université catholique de Louvain, worked in the same team at Icoms, 2012

What the people who worked with him say

Across sixteen years and five companies, the same words keep coming back: vision, pragmatism, and the ability to move from plan to execution.

Public recommendations, verifiable on LinkedIn.

Governance

Loïc Descamps has sat on both sides of a board table. He has reported to a board as a chief executive, and he has served on one as a director.

Board member of Cameroon's national renewable energy association from 2021 to 2024. Non-executive director and investor, from 2014 to 2019, in a mobile technology distribution company he had founded in Kinshasa. Chief Executive Officer, and previously Chief Operating Officer, of an off-grid solar business in Cameroon from 2018 to 2025, through a shareholder transition that ended in its acquisition by a major international energy group.

Certified in Corporate Governance and Director Development. MBA in General Management, University of Birmingham, 2023.

An executive who has presented accounts to a board does not read a board the same way.

Founder, president and head coach of a football academy in Yaoundé, born in a garden in 2023 and formally constituted as an association in January 2024. It is the ground on which the experience in structuring and governing sport and impact projects was built.

”Loïc is a take-charge person who is able to present creative ideas and communicate the benefits. […]

In addition to writing effective training modules for business unit executives, heads and sales representatives, Loïc assumed a leadership role in Privatization Project of Government's Telecommunications Parastatal meetings, sharing international insight, experiences, inspiring and motivating other key stakeholders including the advisors in the Botswana President's office and Minister of Telecommunications. […]

He is a leader and strategic executive team player and would make a great asset to any organization.”

- Grant Son — Non-Executive Member of boards and councils within the South African Government, worked in the same team as Loïc Descamps, 2011

Three Decades of Experience. Two Decades of Leadership.

A career built across Europe and Africa, combining corporate foundations, executive leadership and hands-on transformation in complex markets.

Corporate & Commercial Foundations

Executive Leadership Across Africa & Europe

Cameroon & Central Africa Execution

Building strong foundations in marketing, business development, finance, operations and corporate environments across Europe.

Leading teams, structuring organisations, driving growth, raising capital and managing transformation across demanding business environments.

Preparing market entry, structuring local operations, navigating business realities and supporting hands-on transformation on the ground in Cameroon and Central Africa.

Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

Three connected platforms built around execution, infrastructure, development and impact.

Three connected platforms

Connecting Africa and Europe through business transformation, energy, football development and impact-driven execution.

LD Transform

Strategic advisory and hands-on execution for investors, international companies and executives facing market-entry, growth, transformation or turnaround challenges across African markets.

Soleza

Loïc Descamps also runs Soleza, a solar solutions business in Cameroon. The two do not meet: LD Transform does not advise a company that Soleza equips, and does not propose Soleza to its advisory clients.

An advisor who sells what he recommends is no longer an advisor.

A football, education and youth development academy in Yaoundé, founded and chaired by Loïc Descamps.

It is also the ground on which LD Transform's experience in structuring, governance and business models for sport and impact projects was built.

Golia FC - Golden Lions Association

« You see a problem. I look for what produces it. Then I stay to fix it with you.»

Loïc Descamps

Frequently asked questions

What is LD Transform?

LD Transform is an independent strategic advisory and operating partner helping investors, international companies, executives and entrepreneurs address market-entry, growth, transformation and performance challenges across African markets.

Do you need to know our sector?

Not to be useful on day one.

What we bring is a method: establish the facts, ask the questions the organisation has stopped asking, and work back to the root cause—before proposing anything. That is how we tell a company-market fit problem from an internal one, and it is what decides whether the plan that follows is worth writing.

Sector knowledge helps, and we have it in several industries. It also creates shortcuts, and a shortcut is exactly what stops you seeing what everyone inside has stopped seeing.

Where it matters, the mechanisms travel. Small-ticket collection works the same way in off-grid PayGo, in microfinance and in prepaid telecoms. A sector we have not worked in is not a sector we cannot read.

Where does LD Transform operate?

LD Transform is based in Yaoundé, Cameroon, and supports assignments across African markets. Its strongest operating depth is in Cameroon and Central Africa, complemented by extensive experience in Francophone Africa and executive exposure across several other African regions. The precise delivery model depends on the mandate, the target market and the local expertise required.

Does LD Transform raise capital?

LD Transform supports investment readiness and capital preparation, including business structuring, financial readiness, governance, investor materials and management preparation. Where appropriate, it can support engagement with relevant financial partners. LD Transform does not present itself as a regulated investment intermediary and does not guarantee that funding will be secured.

Does LD Transform work only in Cameroon?

No. Cameroon is LD Transform's operational base and one of its deepest areas of expertise. The firm also supports regional and cross-border assignments in Central and Francophone Africa, and selectively works on broader African growth, transformation and value-creation mandates. Advisory, diagnostic and executive support engagements can be conducted remotely anywhere on the continent.

Does Loïc Descamps take board seats?

Yes, a small number each year. As an independent director appointed by the company, or as a board member on behalf of an investor. One rule applies in both cases: a board seat and a paid LD Transform engagement never run in the same company at the same time. What a company buys here is independence, and it cannot be invoiced twice.

Who does LD Transform work with?

Investors and investment funds. International companies. Boards and senior executives. Entrepreneurs and business owners. Portfolio companies. Development programmes and institutions requiring senior operating expertise.

What makes LD Transform different from a traditional consultancy?

LD Transform is led by a former CEO, COO and Deputy CEO with direct responsibility for business growth, profitability, transformation and turnaround. The firm combines strategic advisory with hands-on operating support and focuses on converting recommendations into prioritised action and measurable execution.

How can an engagement begin?

An engagement usually begins with a strategic discussion, followed—where relevant—by an Executive Strategy Session, an Executive Diagnostic or a clearly scoped project. Longer engagements may include transformation sprints, executive advisory partnerships or interim and fractional leadership mandates.