Davos

From 1999 to 2011, Cornelius was Managing Partner at the law firm CMS Hasche Sigle, with 8 locations in Germany and more than 600 lawyers. As Managing Partner, he initiated and negotiated various mergers, consolidating individual firms into a cross-regional law firm. He integrated CMS Hasche Sigle into the international CMS organisation, which was established in 1999 and now has 74 offices worldwide. Cornelius has been a member of the Executive Committee of CMS since 1999 and was Chairman thereof from 2008 to 2011. Since 2011, he is Executive Chairman of CMS and Senior Partner at CMS Hasche Sigle. Cornelius attended school in Essen/Ruhr District (Germany) and Neuchâtel (Switzerland). He studied law at the universities of Bonn (Germany) and Santander (Spain) and took his first state law exam in 1980. He completed his traineeship in Hamburg, including a position abroad in Chicago, USA. In 1983, he took his second state law exam and started working as a lawyer. In 1986, he became a Partner at the Hamburg law firm Hasche Albrecht Fischer (now: CMS Hasche Sigle). His specialities are corporate and maritime law.

Rainer Esser, Jahrgang 1957, ist Geschäftsführer der ZEIT. Nach einer Banklehre studierte er Jura in München, Genf und London und machte daraufhin seinen Master of Law in den USA. Im Anschluss an das 2. Juristische Staatsexamen besuchte er die Deutsche Journalistenschule in München, arbeitete mehrere Jahre lang als Anwalt und promovierte 1989. Seine erste Leitungsfunktion in den Medien übernahm er im selben Jahr bei der Verlagsgruppe Bertelsmann als Chefredakteur zweier juristischer Fachzeitschriften. 1992 wechselte er in die Position des Geschäftsführers des Spotlight-Verlags und war dort gleichzeitig Herausgeber mehrerer Zeitschriften. Nach vier Jahren als Geschäftsführer der »Main-Post« ging er 1999 zur ZEIT. Seit dem 1. Mai 2011 ist Rainer Esser neben seiner Position bei der ZEIT auch als Geschäftsführer für die DvH Medien GmbH tätig.

Bild©Johannes Arlt

Dr. Uwe Jean Heuser ist Leiter des Ressorts Green der Wochenzeitung DIE ZEIT.

Er studierte Volkswirtschaft in Bonn und Berkeley (USA), promovierte in Köln und erwarb einen Master-Titel in Harvard. Er ist einer der renommiertesten Wirtschaftsjournalisten Deutschlands und erfolgreicher Sachbuchautor.

Bei der ZEIT war er Mitgründer der Reformwerkstatt, die von 1997 bis 2000 weltweit nach neuen Reformideen suchte und auch intern die Öffnung der Zeitung betrieb. Seither leitet er das Wirtschaftsressort. 2015 leitete er die Entwicklung des Magazins ZEIT Geld und gibt das Finanzblatt seitdem auch heraus. 2004 erhielt er den Herbert Quandt Medien-Preis für die Artikelsammlung „Schöpfer und Zerstörer“. 2011 wurde er mit dem Dietrich-Oppenberg-Medienpreis der Stiftung Lesen ausgezeichnet.

Sein Buch „Humanomics“, in dem er die Revolution des ökonomischen Denkens beschreibt, gewann den getAbstract International Book Award als Deutsches Wirtschaftsbuch des Jahres 2008. „Anders Denken“, einem Buch für mehr Gerechtigkeit zwischen den Geschlechtern, war 2013 auf der Shortlist für den deutschen Wirtschaftsbuchpreis. Sein neuestes Buch „Kapitalismus inklusive“ erschien im Oktober 2017 und beschreibt, wie wir den Kampf gegen die Populisten bestehen.

Zusätzlich zu seiner Tätigkeit in der ZEIT-Redaktion ist Uwe Jean Heuser Honorarprofessor für Ökonomie an der Leuphana-Universität in Lüneburg und engagiert sich unter anderem im Kuratorium der Studienstiftung.

Bild©Nicole Sturz

Taavet Hinrikus is Co-founder and CEO of TransferWise. Prior to starting TransferWise, Taavet was Skype’s director of strategy until 2008, starting as its first-ever employee. He’s also a mentor and angel investor. His investments include Tweetdeck, Mendeley, OMGPOP, Betaworks, Sunrise, Improbable and Mapillary among others.

Dr. Josef Joffe ist seit 2000 Herausgeber der ZEIT und war von 2001 bis 2004 auch ihr Chefredakteur. Seine Laufbahn begann er 1976 ebenfalls bei der ZEIT als politischer Redakteur. Neben seiner journalistischen Karriere – unter anderem war er von 1985 bis 2000 Ressortchef bei der »Süddeutschen Zeitung« – machte er auch eine akademische. In den USA unterrichtete er in Harvard, Princeton und Stanford, in Europa lehrte er an der Universität München und am Salzburg Seminar. Sein jüngstes Buch »The Myth of American Decline« erschien 2014 bei W. W. Norton, New York.

Bild©Vera Tammen

Travis Kalanick is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Uber Technologies, Inc. Whether it’s founding the world’s first P2P search engine, or developing the premier enterprise content delivery system, Travis believes that every problem has a solution. You just have to be creative enough to find it. That spirit is at the very core of Uber’s success and ever-expanding global presence, currently in more than 300 cities in 56 countries on six continents. As a student at UCLA, Travis founded Scour, the first peer-to-peer search engine. He later expanded on the concept, forming Red Swoosh, an enterprise content delivery platform, which was eventually acquired by Akamai Technologies. While visiting Paris for LeWeb in 2008, Travis and friend Garrett Camp dreamed of pressing a button on their smartphones one minute, and riding away in a reliable and stylish ride the next. Uber launched a year and a half later, in June 2010 in San Francisco. Under Travis’ leadership, Uber has grown from an exclusive San Franciscobased service to an application used by millions of riders and hundreds of thousands of drivers worldwide. Uber has transformed the fabric of those cities, increasing affordable and reliable transportation options, delivering unmatched earning potential to drivers, reducing drunk driving rates and powering local economic activity. Where some people see dead-ends, Travis finds detours and new solutions to old problems. That approach is revolutionizing the way people move, work and live in cities around the world.

Javier Olivan is the Vice President of Growth. He joined Facebook as Head of International Growth in 2007. Responsible for Facebook’s international efforts, he sets strategy and drives the growth of Facebook’s global user base. In this role, Javier oversees: growth products, growth marketing, Facebook messaging products, as well as all growth analytics and data science efforts. He’s also leading Facebook’s Internet.org efforts, working with mobile operators to accelerate the adoption of the internet around the world. Prior to Facebook, Javier was a Product Manager at Siemens Mobile where he led a cross-functional team charged with the development and market launch of handset devices. Earlier in his career, Javier worked for NTT in Japan as a research and development engineer and was responsible for developing software that enabled high-quality wireless video transmission to mobile devices. Javier holds a master’s degree in business administration from Stanford University and a master’s degree in both electrical and industrial engineering from the University of Navarra.

Koos Timmermans serves as Vice-Chairman of ING Bank as of 1 October 2011. From 1 October 2014 he has, in addition to his current tasks which include aligning ING Bank’s activities and balance sheet with new and upcoming regulation, assumed responsibilities for the Bank’s operations in the Benelux and ING’s sustainability department. Before 1 October 2011 he was Executive Board member/Chief Risk Officer (CRO) of ING Group. In that capacity he was responsible for risk worldwide (Corporate, Market, Insurance, Operational Information & Security risk, Risk Integration and Analytics, Model Validation and Corporate Compliance). Born in 1960, he graduated (MBA) in Economics at Erasmus University in Rotterdam (1986). He started his career with Amro Bank/ABN Amro Bank in the Financial Markets interest-rate and FX derivatives area. Before joining ING in 1996, Koos worked for IBM’s European treasury in Ireland. His responsibilities included Money Markets, FX, Debt issuance and derivatives.

Chris Watson is Global Head of TMC sector group at CMS. He advises on all aspects of international and domestic communications, media, and technology, particularly in the areas of where competition and regulation overlap and on EU law arising in cross-border and complex telecommunications transactions. Chris works extensively with clients in the global telecommunications industry and has consistently been named one of the world’s top 6 lawyers in Telecoms in every issue of the ‘Guide to the World’s Leading Technology, Media and Telecommunications Lawyers’ since 2005. Most recently, he has been listed as one of the five Most Highly Regarded Individuals for Media and Communications Law by Who’s Who Legal: TMT 2016. He received the following comments from clients/the market: “Head of CMS Cameron McKenna’s team is the “excellent” Christopher Watson. With a “leading reputation in the industry”, clients praise him for his “skillful handing of complicated legal problems”. He focuses his practice particularly in areas where competition and regulation overlap, advising an “extensive range of clients” in the global telecommunications industry. The firm has a total of five listings in this year’s edition.” Chris is a past Chairman of the Communications Law Committee of the International Bar Association (IBA) and is now a member of the IBA Council. His memberships also include the Supreme Court of England and Wales, and the Paris Bar. He speaks several European languages.