Companies

Sogea

Created in 1878

Laying pipes

A former subsidiary of Pont-à-Mousson
The story of Eau et Assainissement (the ancestor of Sogea) began in 1878, under the name Etablissements Charles Gibaut. The company did not take the name Eau et Assainissement until 1918, when Pont-à-Mousson decided to add water treatment activities to its traditional foundry business. From the start, Eau et Assainissement was present throughout France, notably in Paris (where it built pipes to supply the city with water from the Voulzie river), Bordeaux and Caen.
It also developed a strong presence in Africa. In 1925, for example, it won a contract to pipe water from the Bou Redine river to Bone in Algeria. A widespread geographical presence helped the group survive the second world war. But Algerian independence in 1961 hastened Eau et Assainissement's merger with Socoman, another Pont-à-Mousson subsidiary with the same chairman and directors.

Pipes and civil engineering
The new company, called Socea, began to diversify under the management of Jacques Lesage. In 1979, it merged with Pont-à-Mousson's construction businesses, Balency-et-Schuhl and GTBA, which had already been merged under the name Balency-Briard. In 1986, the new company, called Sobea, merged with SGE's construction and civil engineering business, and became Sogea, a subsidiary of SGE, now the VINCI group. In France and abroad, through its many subsidiaries, Sogea took part in several projects, such as the Nice airport or the hydraulic and a water treatment plant in Lagos