Mr. Schäfer worked at Robert Bosch GmbH at the trainee program in Germany, Switzerland and the U.S. He was Assistant to General Manager at Power Tools. He later worked at Bain & Co, Munich, Germany as Consultant / Team Leader; at Westig GmbH / Zapp-Group, Germany,and as Director Finance and Controlling, Westig GmbH, Unna, Germany.
Mr. Schäfer worked at Vorwerk-Group, Wuppertal, Germany as a Member of the Board / CFO, Vorwerk Elektrowerke Stiftung & Co KG; at Behr GmbH & Co KG, Stuttgart, Germany as Chief Financial Officer and at Finance, Controlling, IT, HR, Procurement, Legal Affairs, and M&A; he was also simultaneously CEO of Behr Deutschland.
Mr. Schäfer studied in Business Administration at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich, Germany with the final examinations as Diplom-Kaufmann and he earned his Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from INSEAD Fontainebleau.
Mr. Avila worked at Lord Corporation, USA, as Senior Applied Research Development Engineer, Aerospace; Delphi, USA, as Staff Engineer Advanced Systems & Components Product Line Chief Engineer Fuel Handling and Controls; Delphi, Europe as Chief Engineer Powertrain Europe, Director Technical Center Luxembourg.
Mr. Avila then enrolled Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration and their Management Development Programme. After that he was at Delphi Engine Management Systems, USA, as Product Director of Engineering; went to Delphi Diesel Systems, France, as Business Line Executive/General Manager; then worked at Delphi Powertrain and Chassis Europe, France, as Business Director/General Manager; and finally at Delphi Diesel Systems Business Unit, France as Business Unit President/General Manager. He then joind Continental AG as a Member of the Executive Board to lead Powertrain Division.
Mr. Avila studied at the Universidad De Los Andes, Bogota, Colombia where he earned B.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering, at the University of Pittsburgh, USA, where he earning MS degree in Mechanical Engineering; and at the University of Pittsburg, USA, where he earned Master of Business Administration degree.
The company has appointed Mr. Schäfer to act as director of labor relations and he also takes charge of human resources until Ariane Reinhart takes up her duties.
The company appointed Ariane Reinhart to succeed Elke Strathmann as Executive Board member for human resources and director of labor relations
Ms. Reinhart is a lawyer with established and recognized expertise in Human Resources. Since October 2012, she has been on the Board of Bentley Motors Ltd., based in Crewe, England. The company is a wholly owned subsidiary of Volkswagen AG, where she has worked since October 1999. She will assume her office at Continental on/by October 1, 2014.
Ms. Strathmann studied mathematics in Essen, Germany. She started her career as EDP Manager and Training & Development Manager at Procter & Gamble. She was then named Head of Human Resources for the Crailsheim Plant and Head of Human Resources for the Worms Plant also at Procter & Gamble; and then joined Johnson & Johnson as Human Resources Director for Germany and Austria. ■