Owner, President and CEO, Quebecor
On March 10, 2023, Mr. Péladeau buys the Montreal Alouettes. Eight months later, he raises the Grey Cup in Hamilton after an impressive victory by the team over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. This marks the eighth championship in the franchise’s history.
At an early age, Pierre Karl Péladeau developed an interest in business and in Quebecor, the company founded by his father in 1965. After joining the family business in 1985, he ran several of the company’s subsidiaries and oversaw a series of acquisitions that would play a decisive role in Quebecor’s future. In 1999, several years after his father’s death, he became President and CEO of Quebecor.
In 2000, Mr. Péladeau steered the business in a new direction by acquiring Videotron and TVA Group, making Quebecor a major player in the new economy in Canada. In 2008, to preserve and promote Québec culture, he launched Éléphant: The Memory of Québec Cinema, a major philanthropic project dedicated to digitizing, restoring and making accessible Québec’s cinematic heritage.
In 2013, Mr. Péladeau left the corporate world and entered politics the following year. He was elected the Member of the National Assembly for Saint-Jérôme riding under the Parti Québécois banner in April 2014 and became the party’s leader, and leader of the official opposition in Québec’s National Assembly, on May 15, 2015. He served in that position until May 2, 2016.
He has been back at the helm of Quebecor since February 2017. He has also been President of Videotron since June 2021 and Acting President of TVA Group since October 2021.
True to his entrepreneurial spirit, Pierre Karl Péladeau has supported new businesses in multiple ways. Since 1999, Quebecor has been awarding the Pierre Péladeau Bursaries to student entrepreneurs. In November 2021, Mr. Péladeau created asterX, a new venture capital unit that builds long-term relationships with start-ups that have the potential to stimulate innovation within Quebecor and in key industries in Québec.
In April 2023, Mr. Péladeau’s plans for expansion outside Québec in the telecommunications industry came to fruition when, after a lengthy process, Quebecor closed the acquisition of Freedom Mobile, which operates mainly in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario. The combination of Videotron and Freedom has created a fourth strong, competitive national wireless service provider, for the benefit of Canadian consumers.
As President and CEO of Quebecor, Mr. Péladeau oversees the company’s corporate social responsibility policy and its philanthropic commitments. Every year, Quebecor supports over 400 organizations and partners across Québec.
In a personal capacity, Pierre Karl Péladeau serves as President of the Fondation Chopin-Péladeau, a private family foundation named after his parents, Raymonde Chopin and Pierre Péladeau. A firm believer in the importance of accelerating the Montréal taxi industry’s green shift to electric, he acquired Taxelco, a taxi company that includes Diamond Taxi, Taxi Hochelaga and Téo Taxi, in 2019. To help preserve and enhance Québec’s built heritage, he bought in June 2023 the François-Xavier-Garneau house in Québec City, an 1864 heritage building that was the home of the most influential French-Canadian historian of the 19th century; it is now open to the public.
Pierre Karl Péladeau has chaired numerous boards of directors, including LA LA LA Human Steps (1994-2004), the Fondation de l’entrepreneurship (2011-2014), and Hydro-Québec (2013-2014). He has also been a member of the board of directors of the Conseil du patronat du Québec (2007-2010) and the Fondation Lionel-Groulx (2012-2014). He received the Québec National Assembly’s Medal of Honour in 2005 and was named a Chevalier of the Ordre de la Pléiade in 2013. He was named an Officer of the Ordre national du Québec on June 22, 2022.