2019–present: Managing Director, Rheinische Post Medien GmbH and Rheinische Post Verlagsgesellschaft mbH 2014–2018: Managing Director, Funke Medien NRW GmbH, Funke Medien Group 2011–2014: Managing Director, Bertelsmann, rtv mediagroup GmbH, part of arvato 1999–2010: Managing Director, Bauer Media KG, Bauer Media Group 1998–1999: Division Manager at Bauer Media KG; Head of Digital Marketing at Bauer Media KG, Bauer Media Group 1990–1998: Deputy Advertising Manager; Online Project Manager at Axel Springer AG Education/Training: Studied Business Administration; Bachelor of Business Administration; Training as a Publishing Clerk at Axel Springer AG

– Born in 1964 – Studied business administration at Pforzheim University in 1990 – Worked at the Young & Rubicam advertising agency until 1992 – Marketing Director at Nestlé until 2004 – Head of Corporate Brand Management at Deutsche Bahn AG until 2007 – CEO of Molkerei Weihenstephan until 2012 – Chairman of the Board/CEO of Berentzen Gruppe AG until 2017 – CEO of the Teekanne Group until March 2026

Maya Beckmann is Brand Lead at Bayer Consumer Health and is responsible for the Priorin brand both globally and locally. Previously, she worked in global marketing at Colgate Palmolive in Basel and in local marketing at L’Oréal in Düsseldorf. Having grown up in Italy and Germany and studied in London, she brings an international FMCG perspective to brand management.

Florian Lauffer has been Chief Growth Officer at the Peter Schmidt Group, a brand and design agency, and a member of the executive board since 2024. He coordinates all of the company’s growth initiatives.  Previously, Florian served as Executive Director of Consulting and was responsible for strategic consulting on projects such as the corporate design relaunch of HERE Technologies. The New Business Circle platform recognizes him as one of the industry’s most renowned new business leaders and cites Deutsche Telekom, Nivea, and Mercedes-Benz, among others, as examples of pitches he successfully led. However, his responsibilities extend beyond new client acquisition to include the expansion of existing business and the agency’s international growth: He oversees the development of the Milan and Lisbon offices and successfully positions the Peter Schmidt Group within Omnicom’s global network as a design partner for companies in North America.

Christian Rätsch has served as CEO of the BBDO Group for the past three years; with 1,000 creatives and consultants, it is one of the largest agencies in the country. He is also a member of the global management team at BBDO Worldwide. In his previous role, he led the creative powerhouses Saatchi & Saatchi and Leo Burnett to “Agency of the Year” (2022) and established them as top destinations for creativity in Germany. Before his agency career, the brand and digital expert worked as a senior executive in various top management roles at the consulting firm Batten & Company, the IT company T-Systems International, and Deutsche Telekom. In his spare time, Christian Rätsch is a blogger (https://christianraetsch.de), a Top 10 LinkedIn marketing influencer, and an ntv brand expert, focusing on topics such as business development through creativity, big data, and digital marketing transformation. Personally, he is guided by his life motto: “If you want to move people, you have to touch them.”