Sodexo (formerly Sodexho Alliance) is a French food services and facilities management company headquartered in the Paris suburb of Issy-les-Moulineaux. It has 412,088 employees as of 2021, operates in 55 countries and serves 500 million customers on a daily basis. It is Europe’s second largest company of its type by both number of employees and revenue after Compass Group. For fiscal year 2021 (ending August 2010) revenues reached €17.4 billion with an underlying operating profit of 578 million euro. Market capitalization was 11.5 billion euro as at October 26, 2021. Sodexo serves many sectors, including private corporations, government agencies, schools from preschool through university (including seminaries and trade schools), hospitals and clinics, assisted-living facilities, military bases, and prisons. As of 2016 subsidiary Sodexo Justice Services operated support services in 122 prisons in eight countries, including 42 in the Netherlands, 34 in France, and others in Belgium, Italy, Spain, and Chile, as well as directly running 5 prisons in the UK. History The company was launched in 1966 by Pierre Bellon (Chairman) in Marseille, France, initially serving company restaurants, schools and hospitals under the name Société d'Exploitation Hotelière (). Today Sodexo is on the Fortune Global 500 list and the second largest employer among all French multi-national corporations. Throughout the 1970s, the company expanded in France and internationally; first in Belgium, then Africa, and finally the Middle East. After an initial public offering on the Paris Bourse in 1983, the firm continued its expansion into North America, South America, Japan, South Africa and Russia. In 1994, on October 31, Sodexo began operations in India. Currently Sodexo India has over 40,135 employees. The head office is situated in Goregaon, Mumbai. In 1997, Société d'Exploitation Hotelière's holding company changed its name to Sodexho, and joined forces with Universal Ogden Services, the leading remote-site service provider in the U.S. On January 11, 1995, Sodexo S.A. acquired food company Gardner Merchant Ltd. from Cinven and CVC Capital Partners In 1998, Sodexho merged with Marriott Management Services, at the time one of the largest food services companies in North America. Included in the merger was a name change to Sodexho Marriott Services. The merger helped the company become one of the largest food services providers in the United States. In June 2001, Sodexho acquired complete control of Sodexho Marriott Services. In 2002, Sodexho was listed on the New York Stock Exchange, but the company withdrew its