Dr. Frieling arbeitete nach Abschluss seines Medizinstudiums und Promotion bis 1984 u.a. im Universitätskrankenhaus Eppendorf als Arzt in den Abteilungen Anästhesie, Innere Medizin und Chirurgie. Anschließend war er in der wissenschaftlichen Produktbetreuung der Schering AG, Berlin, beschäftigt. Nach einem zusätzlichen MBA (Master of Business) Studium am INSEAD in Fontainebleau wechselte er 1990 zu Arthur D. Little International. Als Associate Director und Partner im Europäischen Board leitete er hier den Health-Care-Bereich mit. Im Frühjahr 1999 übernahm er die Leitung des internationalen Marketings und der Medizin der ASTA-Medica AG.

Zur Zeit ist Dr. Frieling Vorsitzender des Vorstandes der LabNet AG, Hamburg, einem führenden Unternehmen der medizinischen Labordiagnostik.

Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the United States of America

Wolfgang Ischinger, German Ambassador to the United States of America since July 31, 2001, was born in 1946 near Stuttgart in southern Germany and joined the German Foreign Service in 1975 with German law degree and a a master’s degree from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He worked at the UN in New York and was posted to Washington, D.C., and to Paris. In Bonn, he served as special assistant to Foreign Ministers Genscher and Kinkel. From 1993 to 1998, Ambassador Ischinger served in various senior positions in the Foreign Ministry where he led the German delegations to a number of international negotiating processes, including the Bosnia Peace Talks at Dayton, Ohio, the negotiations concerning the NATO-Russia Founding Act, as well as the negotiations on NATO enlargement and on the Kosovo crisis.

From 1998 to 2001, Wolfgang Ischinger served as State Secretary, the highest civil service post, in the German Foreign Office.

 Mr. Ischinger has published widely on foreign policy, security and arms control policy as well as on European and transatlantic issues.

 He serves on several non-profit boards, including the Board of Overseers of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, the East-West Institute in New York, the Alfred Herrhausen Gesellschaft, Frankfurt, the Council on Public Policy, and AFS Germany (American Field Service). He is also Chairman of the Ambassadors Advisory Board of the Executive Council on Diplomacy in Washington, D.C.

 Wolfgang Ischinger is married and has two children. He is a certified professional ski instructor and holds a private pilot’s license.

Geboren 1955 in Berlin; Studium Germanistik, Journalismus und Philosophie in München; Promotion ("summa cum laude") über Werbung; Regisseur und Darsteller für zeitgenössisches Musiktheater (1973-1981); Studium des Verlagswesens an Harvard University, Cambridge; zweijährige Verlagstätigkeit in New York; Master of Business Administration an INSEAD, Fontainebleau (Frankreich); Verschiedene verlegerische und geschäftsführende Positionen in der Langenscheidt Verlagsgruppe (1985-1994); Vorstandsmitglied bei Bibliographisches Institut & F.A. Brockhaus AG (1988-2001); seit 2002 dort im Aufsichtsrat; Verleger und persönlich haftender Gesellschafter in der Langenscheidt Verlagsgruppe (zusammen mit Vater und Bruder; bis 1994); Stiftungsratsmitglied World-Wide Fund for Nature (WWF); Initiator und Vorstandsvorsitzender "Children For A Better World"; Gesellschafter "Deutsche Kinder-und Jugendstiftung"; Kuratoriumsmitglied "Stiftung Lesen"; Vorstandsmitglied "Atlantik-Brücke"; Lehrauftrag an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, München (1988 - 2001); Moderator von "nachtclub" und "Münchner Runde"/ Bayerisches Fernsehen (seit 1992); Mitglied des Verlegerausschusses des Börsenvereins des Deutschen Buchhandels (1992-1999); Leiter der AG Grundlagen im Initiativkreis Zukunft beim Bundespräsidenten (1996-1999); Buchautor („1000 Glücksmomente“ 1991,“Sternschnuppenwünsche“ 1992, „Glück mit Kindern“ 1997, „100 x MUT. Beispielhaftes fürs dritte Jahrtausend“ 1999); Gesellschafter bei der Langenscheidt-Verlagsgruppe (Langenscheidt, Langenscheidt-Longman, Brockhaus, Duden, Meyer, Polyglott, APA, Hexaglot u.a.), i:FAO, Newsports, Ciando, TV Guide, GAP, Fantastic, Deutsche Standards Editionen, IP Planet, Friendlyway, Upsolut Sports, Transatlantic Ventures u.a.

CEO QVentures GmbH & Co. KG

Rainer Lauterbach graduated from the Wharton MBA Program in 2000. His major in Entrepreneurial Management prepared him well to build a portfolio of Venture Capital direct investments for QVENTURES, an affiliate of the family wealth management firm, Harald Quandt Holding GmbH, in Bad Homburg, Germany. Parallel to running QVentures, he is responsible for Private Equity and VC Fund investments nationally and internationally for Harald Quandt Holding.

 Before Wharton, he was employed by IBM from 1991 till 1997 in the areas of Software and Business Development in Germany, the United States and Great Britain. He spent his summer internship in 1999 in Milan and Rome with Value Partners, a strategic management consulting firm. Since 2003, Rainer Lauterbach has enrolled in the external Ph.D. program in Entrepreneurial Finance at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, Germany, with a research focus on risk and performance aspects of Venture Capital and Private Equity investments. In his spare time, he likes snowboarding and participating at humanitarian projects in developing countries.

Before joining Lehman Brothers, Mr. Meissner spent 10 years at Goldman Sachs where he served as Co-head of European Equity Capital Markets. He was a Managing Director and Partner. During his career at Goldman Sachs, Mr. Meissner was responsible, first, for developing the firm's primary equity business in Germany, Austria and Switzerland as well as, at a later stage, running the firm's financing business with clients in the TMT (telecommunications, media and technology area). Mr. Meissner was involved in many landmark transactions for his German DAX clients such as Deutsche Telekom (IPO in 1996 and subsequent financings), Siemens (IPO of Infineon Technologies in 2000 and various other transactions), Infineon Technologies (IPO and subsequent capital increase and hybrid equity issues), Daimler-Chrysler (NYSE listing in 1994 and various hybrid equity issues), Commerzbank (first German capital increase without pre-emptive rights in 1997), Allianz (NYSE listing in 2000 and capital increase in 2003) and HypoVereinsbank (IPO of Bank Austria Creditanstalt in 2003). In addition, he was involved in a large number of transactions for small- and mid-cap clients such as Puma (sale of a 40% stake by NewRegency Enterprises in 2003), Qiagen (Neuer Markt listing in 1997), Consors (IPO in 1999), T-Online (IPO in 2000) and many others.

Mr. Meissner began his career as a financial analyst at Morgan Stanley in New York and in the Corporate Finance Department at Deutsche Bank AG in Frankfurt and London. He holds a B.A. in European History from Princeton University.

Matthias joined Merrill Lynch from Goldman Sachs in May 2000.  At Goldman Sachs he was a Managing Director with responsibility for the German speaking region.  He led there over 50 equity transactions, including the Deutsche Telekom privatisation (1996 and 1999) and was involved in various M&A transactions.  From 1986 to 1991 Matthias worked at Deutsche Bank where he was the personal assistant to the late CEO Alfred Herrhausen and later the Head of Debt Capital Markets origination in Germany.  He was educated at the Universities of Bonn, Geneva and Heidelberg, where he gained a Doctor of Law degree.

Bolko von Oetinger, born in 1943, holds a master's degree in Political Science and received his doctorate from the Faculty of Economics and Social Affairs at the FU Berlin. In 1974, he received an MBA from Stanford University and joined The Boston Consulting Group, San Francisco office. Eventually he transferred to Paris and in 1975 to Munich, being founding member of the first BCG office in Germany. He led the German operations from 1981 to 1992 and served on the firm's management and executive committee from 1983 to 1995. Since 1981, Dr. von Oetinger has been directing the Kronberg Conferences, BCG's renowned strategy conferences for senior executives in Germany. He headed BCG's worldwide marketing operations from 1994 to 1997 and in 1998 founded the firm's Strategy Institute, in which BCG has concentrated its research with academic and scientific institutions about the nature of strategy. Von Oetinger has written several articles and published four books on strategy, globalization and innovation. In 1999, he became a member of the Advisory Board of the Stanford Graduate School of Business. At the beginning of 2004, von Oetinger was appointed honorary Professor at the WHU Koblenz, lecturing there since 1998. Contact: oetinger.bolko.von@bcg.com

Dr Lutz R Raettig was born in Berlin on 27 January 1943.  He received his MBA at Hamburg University in 1967 and went on to complete his Doctorate in Finance also at the University of Hamburg in 1969.

 In 1995 Lutz Raettig joined Morgan Stanley Dean Witter as Managing Director and Chairman of the Management Board of Morgan Stanley Bank AG in Frankfurt, where he is also Head for Germany and Austria.  He was additionally appointed Vice Chairman Europe in 1992.  He also holds Board and Director responsibilities for a number of other companies, including professional organizations, charities and art committees.  He is also a Board Member of the Association of German Banks.

 Prior to joining the firm, Lutz Raettig worked for Commerzbank AG for eight years as Head of Investment Banking, Head of Global Corporate Banking (Frankfurt) and co-Head of North America in New York.  He also served 18 years at Westdeutsche Landesbank (WestLB), specialising in Investment Banking, Capital Markets and Corporate Banking and was located in Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, London and New York.  He oversaw a large number of projects related to governments, industrial companies, as well as the financial services industry.

The talent behind the critically acclaimed Wölffer Estate wines belongs to a gifted young German winemaker, Roman Roth, whose training and experience are a blend of several wine cultures on three continents.

Roman was born in Rottweil, Germany, in the Black Forest. After a three-year apprenticeship at the Kaiserstuhl Wine Cooperative in Oberrotweil Roman worked at acclaimed wineries around the world: the Saintsbury Estate in California, the Rosemount Estate in New South Wales, Australia and back in Germany at Winzerkeller Wiesloch in Baden. In 1992 he earned his Master Winemaker and Cellar Master degree from the College for Oenology and Viticulture in Weinsberg and also accepted Christian Wölffer’s invitation to join him in New York to be the first winemaker at what was then the mere start-up of a winery, the Sagpond Vineyards in Sagaponack, New York, on the South Shore of Long Island’s posh East End. Over the next several years, Roman managed the cultivation and expansion of the vineyards, which today number 55 acres, and the vinification, ultimately producing wines that embody the essence of the Hamptons appellation - ripe fruit and natural acidity born of a unique terroir, a lush combination of soil, sun, moisture and the ever - present maritime breezes from the nearby Atlantic Ocean.

Dr. Susanne Shields

Dr. Susanne Shields is a lecturer at the Joseph H. Lauder Institute of Management & International Studies where she is responsible for the German language and culture program. She teaches courses in contemporary social, political, cultural and business issues and has been the country director for the annual Lauder German summer immersion program since 1996.  She also teaches advanced language courses for undergraduate students in the University of Pennsylvania German Department, where she specializes in the topics ‘European Union’ and ‘Foreign in Germany’. 

Dr. Shields holds a Staatsexamen in Education from the Johann Wolfgang Goethe Universität in Frankfurt/M. Germany, and a Master’s degree in German literature from Pennsylvania State University.  She received her Ph.D. in German Literature from the University of Pennsylvania.

She is especially interested in cross-cultural communication, focusing on the relationship between foreign language study and cultural understanding in the business context, and has done research in this area. In her spare time, she enjoys bicycling, reading and interior design.

Nicolaj Siggelkow is a tenured associate professor of management at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. He earned his Ph.D. in Business Economics from Harvard University.  His current research focuses on the strategic and organizational implications of interactions among a firm’s choices of activities and resources.  His recent papers study the evolution of activity systems and the strategic consequences of contextual interactions among activities. Other research projects include agent-based simulation models of organizational design and a large-scale study of developmental growth trajectories in the mutual fund industry.  His work has been published in the Academy of Management Journal, Administrative Science Quarterly, Complexity, Journal of Industrial Economics, Management Science, and Organization Science.  Professor Siggelkow is a multiple recipient of The Wharton School’s MBA Excellence in Teaching Award.

MBA HSG, betreut als Program and Project Manager beim DAAD in New York deutsche Stipendiaten und Wissenschaftler während ihres Aufenthalts in Nordamerika.

Von Anfang 2003 bis Mitte 2004 arbeitete er gemeinsam mit Prof. Peter Glotz (Hochschule St. Gallen) an einem Beratungsprojekt für die Deutsche Rentenversicherung.

Herr Tempich studierte im Rahmen eines internationalen MBA Programms in St. Gallen, Luxemburg und an der Haas School of Business, Berkeley. Zuvor hat er mehrere Jahre als Wirtschaftskorrespondent für deutsche Medien aus den USA berichtet, unter anderem für n24, Financial Times Deutschland, Handelsblatt und manager-magazin online. Von August 2000 bis Juni 2001 leitete er die New Yorker Niederlassung eines deutschen Medienunternehmens. Vor dem Umzug in die USA arbeitete er unter anderem als Berater für Verlage und als Dozent in der Ausbildung von Verlags- und Werbekaufleuten. Herr Tempich ist Diplom-Kommunikationswirt der HdK Berlin (jetzt UdK), wo er von 1986 bis ‘91 studierte.

Christoph Vogel holds the position of Vice President at Siemens Management Consulting, the internal top management consultancy of Siemens in New York.  He started to work for SMC in Munich, Germany in 1997 where he supported Siemens businesses in Germany and various European countries.  He works in the US since 2000 and established the US office of SMC in New York in 2001.  Christoph serves a number of Siemens Businesses in the US as well as in Europe, with a focus on all the Automation and Controls groups, Power Distribution, and Automotive. He also co-leads the Strategy and Growth Practice.

Christoph studied Business Engineering at the University of Kaiserslautern and worked there as a research assistant at the chair of Business Informatics and Operations Research of Prof. Heiner Mueller-Merbach. He holds a doctorate in Business Administration. 

He lives in New York with his wife and four children. He spends his free time with his family and coaches youth soccer teams.

Norbert Walter is Chief Economist of Deutsche Bank Group and CEO of Deutsche Bank Research.  Before his current position he was professor and director at the renowned Kiel Institute for World Economics and was a John J. McCloy Distinguished Research Fellow at the American Institute for Contemporary Studies at the Johns Hopkins University in Washington, DC (1986-1987).  He holds a PhD in Economics from the Johann-Wolfgang-Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main.

 As Chief Economist of Deutsche Bank Group Norbert Walter is responsible for a globally integrated approach in economic research.  He manages Deutsche Bank Research, Deutsche Bank's think tank, which covers a wide spectrum of issues ranging from economic forecasting to country rating and sector analysis.  Services are rendered to the Bank's board, staff, customers and the general public.  In addition to holding these responsibilities at Deutsche Bank, Professor Walter is a valued adviser for politicians, among them the European Parliament. Since October 2002 he is a member of the inter-institutional monitoring group (appointed by the European Parliament, the Council and the European Commission) for securities markets.

 Norbert Walter, as chief economist at the Deutsche Bank loves debate, and he will gladly hold forth on anything from the future of East German housing estates, the prospects offered by the internet, the euro or the role of the IMF.  Many know him – as he says himself, like a cup of Espresso: small, dark and strong – from watching the evening news bulletins.  When it is a question of explaining economic issues, editors of television news, programmes, and newspaper and magazine editors, look to the 59-year old based in Frankfurt for comment and explanation. To this extent, he is the nation's economist.