Ottobock and its board of directors announced that Oliver Jakobi, current interim CEO, will continue to lead the company as CEO and will continue as its chief sales officer (CSO). Jakobi began serving as the interim CEO in May 2022.
“After more than three decades of working at Ottobock, Oliver Jakobi is a highly experienced industry expert and knows our company inside out. In recent months, he has shown that he is the best candidate to lead Ottobock into the next phase of its development,” said Professor Hans Georg Näder, majority owner and chairman of the board of directors.
Prior to his role as interim CEO, Jakobi was responsible for global operations in his role as CSO, leading the company’s regions and markets as well as its more than 390 patient care facilities worldwide. In his role as CEO, the sales, legal and compliance, communications, and public affairs departments will report to him. The focus of his work will be on the further execution of the company’s growth strategy.
“I would like to thank professor Hans Georg Näder and the entire board for the trust they have placed in me,” Jakobi said. “Now I look forward to working with our colleagues to leverage our innovative power and our strong growth potential to further expand our leading market position. Going forward, we will focus even more consistently on our users.”
In other news, Michael Kaschke, PhD, is the newest member of the board, moving from supervisory board to the board of directors, where he took up his position as an additional non-executive director.
Georgia Näder, great-granddaughter of company founder Otto Bock, resigned from the company’s supervisory board and joined Ottobock’s operating business. As vice president of futuring mediterranee and business transition, Georgia Näder will be responsible for the orderly generation change at the Ottobock foreign subsidiary in France as well as future concepts for efficient cooperation between headquarters and the markets.
Kaschke and Georgia Näder will be succeeded on the supervisory board by Jan Willem de Cler and Christoph Seibt.