Dr. Markus Hellenthal
Dr. iur. Markus Hellenthal, former law enforcement officer and Director of the German Federal Police, 66 years old, has more than 40 years of professional experience in leading positions in the public sector.
Since July 2021, Markus has been Senior Vice President of Materna Communication & Information SE, reporting directly to the CEO, is responsible for the strategic business development of the group in the public sector market, for major programs and, in parallel, until the end of 2023, Managing Director of Infora GmbH, a wholly owned consultancy subsidiary of the Group. He is Executive Sponsor for the Group’s Defence & Security business, the secure mobile communication business line Virtual Solution and the Public Sector AI competence center.
From October 2019 to October 2021, Markus was Managing Director Public Sector of RSBG (RAG Stiftung Beteiligungs-Gesellschaft), a 100% subsidiary of the RAG Foundation and its operating arm. He was responsible for the public sector business with P&L for the RSBG cluster Information and Communication Technology. In parallel, he was Executive Sponsor for the business development of the public sector business for all RSBG companies.
Previously, Markus was Executive Vice President of Capgemini Germany, responsible for the Public Sector business unit since January 2016, selling and delivering large projects across Capgemini’s entire technology and services portfolio, including those delivered from software solution centers in Poland, to public sector clients at federal and state levels in Germany.
Previously, since January 2013, Markus was Vice President of IBM’s Business Unit Public Sector for Germany, Austria and Switzerland, selling and delivering the company’s technology and services portfolio.
From 2008 to 2012, he was Senior Vice President of the Thales Group and Chairman of the Management Board and Managing Director of “Thales Deutschland GmbH”, as well as a member of the Supervisory Boards of ESG GmbH, Diehl AirCabin GmbH and Diehl Aerospace GmbH. During his tenure, he successfully managed to create one “Thales Deutschland GmbH” from the former 12 individual Thales companies “in Germany”, organised in 8 legal entities, and was able to achieve stable business success even during the European economic crisis from 2008 to 2010.
From 2004 to 2008, he was Senior Vice President and Managing Director of EADS’ (now Airbus) global non-military IT systems integration business for public security projects, including major border security programs in Romania (€900 million), Saudi Arabia (€2 billion) and Qatar (€240 million).
From 1997 to 2004, he was a partner at Accenture DACH, starting with the first-ever SAP implementation at a German government agency (Customs) and then focusing on large public security projects, including in the US (US Visit, $10 billion) and Singapore (Central Register of Foreigners). In parallel, he was IT Security Officer for Accenture Germany and from 2001 to 2004 Managing Director of Accenture’s Public Sector Market Unit for the whole of the Middle East, based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Markus began his career in the police and public administration of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Until his voluntary retirement in 1997, he served as a law enforcement officer, Director of the German Federal Police and Head of the Federal Police and Aviation Security Department at the German Federal Ministry of the Interior. Among other things, he pushed through the employment of women in the Federal Police and the privatization of aviation security at all German commercial airports, was involved in the border security preparations for the German Unification Treaty and oversaw the modernization of the Federal Police’s IT with the creation of its first own data center.
From 2004 to 2014, Markus was involved in European and German security research activities, including as founding president of the European Security Research and Advisory Board of the European Commission at the suggestion of the German government. Since then, he has been a member of various governmental and academic advisory bodies, including, since 2006, the Professional Advisory Board of the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism (ICT) at Reichman University in Herzliya, Israel. He has published extensively in the fields of security and security policy, strategic management and transformation. He is a member of various IT, security and defense associations.
Dr. iur. Markus Hellenthal grew up in Germany and the UK and studied Law and Public Administration in Cologne, Public Management in Speyer and Business Administration in St. Gallen.
