Completion of the generation change on the Board of Management

  • Torsten Grede, Spokesman of the Board of Management wants to resign from office in 2023
  • Tom Alzin, Member of the Board of Management, will take over his position
  • Melanie Wiese will join DBAG as Chief Financial Officer

Frankfurt/Main, 14 December 2022. Torsten Grede, Spokesman of the Board of Management of Deutsche Beteiligungs AG (DBAG), intends to resign from his office as member and Spokesman of the Board of Management, effective at the end of February 2023 in the best possible agreement with the Supervisory Board. This was announced today by Torsten Grede and the Supervisory Board of DBAG. The new Spokesman of the Board of Management as of 1 March 2023 is to be Management Board member Tom Alzin. Melanie Wiese will join DBAG’s Board of Management as the new Chief Financial Officer on 1 January 2023 and assume responsibility for Finance from Torsten Grede.

“My decision to ask the Supervisory Board for early termination of my position on the Board of Management, following 32 years at DBAG, completes the generational change in the Board of Management which has been planned for a long time,” Torsten Grede said today. He added: “I am especially delighted that it will be those colleagues with whom I have had the pleasure to work with for many years who will be managing DBAG from now on, together with Melanie Wiese, and that the Supervisory Board will appoint Tom Alzin as Spokesman of the Board of Management.”

DBAG’s Board of Management currently comprises three members: Torsten Grede, Tom Alzin and Jannick Hunecke. Torsten Grede has been a member of the Board of Management since 2001 and has been Spokesman of the Board since 2013.

“The Supervisory Board would like to express its sincere thanks to Torsten Grede for the many years of successful collaboration,” Dr Hendrik Otto, Chairman of DBAG’s Supervisory Board, stated today. “He has shaped DBAG’s strategic development and growth, playing a crucial part in establishing DBAG as a leading German private equity firm, with assets under management or advisory of 2.5 billion euros.”

Tom Alzin, who has worked at DBAG since 2004 and joined the Board of Management in 2021, will assume the role of Spokesman of the Board of Management on 1 March 2023. “I am very pleased with the confidence of the Supervisory Board,” Tom Alzin said. “I am convinced that DBAG is pursuing the right path with its strong positioning as one of Germany's most renowned private equity firms and our new strategic initiatives. These include expanding our activities in the Italian market, broadening our range of equity solutions for medium-sized and primarily family-run companies, and focusing on sectors that benefit from structural growth. I will do everything I can to further advance the dynamic development of the company,” he added.

Melanie Wiese worked for energy companies E.ON SE and Innogy SE, both based in Essen, and Bayernwerk AG, Regensburg, between 2017 and 2022. Most recently, she has been a member of the Management Board at both Innogy SE and Bayernwerk AG, being responsible for Finance (CFO at Bayernwerk AG). Prior to that, she had assumed the roles of Head of Accounting & Reporting at Innogy SE and Head of Group Accounting at E.ON SE, dealing with a wide range of topics, including group accounting, M&A, taxes, controlling and financing. Before joining technology company ZF Friedrichshafen in 2014, where she headed the international Shared Service Organisation until 2017, Melanie Wiese had worked as a consultant at Accenture Management Consulting and The Hackett Group.

“We are very pleased that Melanie Wiese, a renowned financial expert with many years of management experience in German industry, will join DBAG,” Dr Hendrik Otto, Chairman of the Supervisory Board, stated today. “Continuity and a long-term horizon are the main pillars of the private equity business; the smooth generational change in the Board of Management is testament to that and DBAG’s Board of Management stands for these values in its new composition.”