Advisory Board

President of the Advisory Board

Dr. Wolfgang Clement was Prime Minister of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia from 1998 to 2002 and German Minister of Commerce and Labour from 2002 to 2005.

After having passed the Abitur [German school-leaving exam], an internship at a newspaper, university studies in law and having passed the 1st-level bar exam as well as after having completed an assistantship at the Institute for Procedural Law at the University of Marburg, Clement was, beginning in 1968, initially a political editor, later the Political Division Director and ultimately the Deputy Editor-in-Chief of the Westfälischen Rundschau [name of newspaper] in Dortmund. From 1986 to 1989, he was the Editor-in-Chief of the Hamburger Morgenpost [name of newspaper].

From 1981 to 1986, Wolfgang Clement was the spokesperson for the German Federal Executive Board and, at the same time from 1985 to 1986, the Deputy National Director of the SPD [Social Democratic Party]. In 1989, the North Rhine-Westphalia Prime Minister at the time, Johannes Rau, appointed him to be the Head of the State Chancellery Office. Beginning on 13 July 1990, he held this office with the title of Minister of Special Affairs.  After the state elections in 1995, he belonged to Rau’s cabinet as the Minister of Commercial and Medium-Sized Businesses, Technology and Transportation.

On 14 July 1997, he was granted an honorary doctorate diploma in engineering (Dr.-Ing. e.h.) by the Electrical Engineering Department of the Long-Distance University / University of Applied Sciences of Hagen. On 12 November 2004, he received an honorary law doctorate (Dr. jur. h.c.) from the Law School of Ruhr-Universität [name of university] Bochum.

Wolfgang Clement is a book author and freelance columnist, a member of various supervisory boards, boards of trustees and advisory councils of national and international companies as well as of research institutes. He is the Vice-President of the Frankfurt Future Advisory Board.

Vice-President of the Advisory Board

After his retail and wholesale business training, Wilfried Mocken became the Sales Director at Convent Knabber-Gebäck [Bakery Products] GmbH & Co. KG, Cologne in 1971. Since the founding of the “sportfit” Company, today called Valensina GmbH, in 1981, he worked in cooperation with the Underberg AG Company and joined the Underberg Company in 1982. There, in 1982, he was appointed to the chief representative of H. Underberg-Albrecht KG. Since 1988, Mocken has been the CEO of Semper idem Underberg AG.

Since 1987, Mocken has been a member of the Executive Board of the Bundesverbandes der Deutschen Spirituosen-Industrie und –Importeure [German National Association for the Liquor Industry and Liquor Importers] e.V. (BSI). From 1993 until 1996, he was the Vice –President of the BSI.

In 2009, upon the recommendation of Prime Minister Dr. Jürgen Rüttgers, the former Bundespräsident [German President] Dr. Horst Köhler awarded Mocken the Bundesverdienstkreuz [German Cross of Merit].

Member of the Advisory Board

In 1980, Dr. Carl Albrecht Schade successfully completed his exam to become a Dipl. Kaufmann [university graduate in business management] and, in 1984, received his doctorate to become Dr. rer. pol. [doctorate holder in political science] from the Johann – Wolfgang – Goethe – Universität [name of university], Frankfurt am Main.

From 1981 to 1989, Schade worked for various banks in the commercial and corporate finance areas. From 1989 to 1996, he was the Commercial Managing Director for Medium-Sized Companies (annual sales DM 450 million). From 1996 until 1998, Schade managed the branch in North Rhine-Westphalia of IKB Deutsche Industriebank [name of bank] AG in Dusseldorf. Then, Schade was appointed to be a member of the Management Board of the WGZ – Bank West-deutsche Genossenschafts - Zentralbank [name of bank] AG in Dusseldorf until 2002 where he was responsible for all corporate clients and the private equity business. From 2002 to 2003, he was a partner at DIC Deutsche Investors Capital AG.

Today, Schade is the Presiding Partner at Dr. Schade GmbH & Co. KG Finanzberatung [Financial Consulting Firm], Dusseldorf as well as the CFO and a shareholder of  ADELTA.FINANZ [FINANCE] AG, Dusseldorf.

Member of the Advisory Board

After completing his apprenticeship as a locksmith, Gottfried Mahn received his diploma in mechanical engineering with honours in 1966. Then, he was trained by the German army to become a technical reserve officer. In this case, his core assignment was to maintain aircraft engines. In 1968, Mahn worked for six months at the Homag-Henschel Company in Hanover in the area of heavy-duty lorry chassis design.

From 1969 – 1975, he was the planning engineer at the Volkswagen factory in Hannover. In Hannover, his work duties included the mechanical production planning for the construction of motors, the procurement and commissioning of an NC processing centre as well as the introduction of automatic programming in APT and EXAPT. From 1975 – 1987, he worked  for various stations of production planning to eventually become the Main Divisional Director of Production Planning for the Construction of Motors, Axles and Vehicles at Volkswagen de México. In addition, Mahn worked from 1984 until 1987 as the Divisional Director for Production Planning. In 1987, he returned to Germany to Volkswagen AG where he worked as a Project Manager for the new Transporter (T4) at the Hannover factory. From 1991 until 1994, Mahn held the position of Production Manager at the Emden Factory where he was responsible for the shell construction, painting, mounting as well as planning and site management.

Beginning in 1994, he worked as the Factory Manager for IVECO Magrius AG in Ulm. Thereafter, beginning in 1995, he worked for IVECO Magirus AG Werke in Ulm and Madrid as the General Manager for the Heavy-Duty Lorry Business Unit while being responsible for development, purchasing and production. Yet the same year, he was appointed the Production Division Director for IVECO Magirus AG. He then began working in 1997 as the Management Board spokesman for IVECO Magirus AG until he was appointed to be the CEO in 1999.

Beginning in 2000, he became the CEO at NEOPLAN in Stuttgart, a manufacturer of travel and public service buses. Beginning in 2002, he worked as the Managing Director of SCHMIDT-Holding [name of holding company] GmbH – a manufacturer of municipal technology and special vehicle construction. Beginning in 2005, he worked as a member of the Supervisory Board and as a consultant for SCHMIDT Holding. In addition, he assumed diverse consulting duties for small- and medium-sized companies. Beginning in 2007, Mahn returned to work as a Managing Director for the Schmidt Company until it was taken over in the middle of 2008 by AEBI, Switzerland.

At the end of 2007, he founded the “Commercial Vehicle Swabia” cluster.

Member of the Advisory Council

Up to now, Bernd Sexauer has, within the parameters of approx. 50 private equity transactions, realised investment earnings of more than EUR 350 million. The expert is contributing 20 years of know-how in the private equity area to the advisory board. He possesses a broad diversity of transactional experience with a focus on medium-sized companies. His comprehensive expertise in quite varied corporate and financing situations (succession, growth, IPO, restructuring, etc.) is underscored by international activities; among others, which are related to corporate and fund investments as well as diverse functions on bodies/from mandates.

After working at a bank trainee in Cologne, Mr. Sexauer completed his business management studies at the Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main while receiving a business management diploma with honours. During his professional career, Bernd Sexauer worked until 2006 at Deutschen Beteiligungs [name of investment company] AG in Frankfurt am Main and, as a long-time member of the executive management, held co-responsibility for the development of the buy-out business. He then worked until 2008 as the Managing Director for DZ Equity Partner GmbH in Frankfurt am Main. Thereafter, he worked as the Presiding Partner of Prolimity Capital Partners in Frankfurt am Main which specialises in restructuring situations. Most recently, as the sole Managing Director (CEO), he managed Heliad Equity Partners which is listed on the stock exchange.