16 Mai Association Gets New Leadership: Valentina Daiber, O2 Telefónica, takes over as VATM President – Wolfram Rinner, GasLINE, is Vice President
• New executive committee reflects the wide diversity of the association’s members: O2 Telefónica, GasLINE, 1&1 Telecommunication SE, Deutsche GigaNetz, Deutsche Glasfaser, dtms, ecotel, freenet, Plusnet and Vodafone
• Sincere thanks to outgoing president David Zimmer
• Shaping the digital transformation: VATM becomes the ‘Association of Providers in the Digital and Telecommunications Market’
Cologne, 16. May 2025. A new leadership team will be in charge of the association in the coming years. At yesterday’s general meeting, the executive committee of Germany’s most important telecommunications industry association voted for Valentina Daiber, Chief Legal Officer and Head of Corporate Affairs at Telefónica Deutschland, as its new president. Wolfram Rinner, the managing director of GasLINE, was elected as vice-president.
“I am very happy to represent the association with a strong executive committee at such an exciting time for the industry and to work together to provide the necessary energy for the market,” says Valentina Daiber, who has been a member of the executive committee for ten years and served as vice-president for four years. “The association has been living its motto, ‘Competition connects’, for more than 25 years. After all, it is the companies in the telecommunications market that are making the German economy digital and bringing the digital world to people. We connect companies and people.
What we need now is a political and regulatory framework that truly supports competition, paving the way for faster rollout, more innovation, and better services for everyone. The new federal government must finally move forward with long-overdue legislative changes. It’s a good sign that these issues will now be handled by a dedicated digital ministry, led by a federal digital minister with real-world business and industry experience. Time is short. Action is needed and fast. The VATM’s member companies and the newly elected executive committee are ready to engage and work together.”
On behalf of the entire association, the new president thanked the long-serving outgoing president, David Zimmer, who stepped down from the executive committee at his own request. Over the past four years, the association has greatly benefited from his expertise, his passion for the industry, and his steady leadership. Thanks to his strong reputation in political circles and with the Federal Network Agency, Zimmer played a key role in ensuring that the association’s voice was heard and respected.
The association members would also like to express their sincere thanks to outgoing Executive Board members Dr. Marc Schütze (Group United Internet and 1&1) and Peter Zils (ecotel communication AG), who played a key role in shaping the association with their extensive industry expertise over many years.
Wolfram Rinner, the new Vice President of VATM, emphasised the significant financial investments made by competitors in the telecommunications market. “For decades, Telekom’s competitors have made the largest investments in providing citizens with high-performance infrastructure. What these investments need most is planning. However, excessive bureaucracy at federal, state and local levels remains one of the biggest obstacles to expansion and digitalisation. Outdated structures must finally be replaced, and procedures and processes must be sped up,” said Rinner, who has been a member of the VATM executive committee since 2021.
A strong team of re-elected and new executive board members is supporting the President and the Vice President. These include:
– Timm Degenhardt, Chairman of the Audit Committee of Deutsche Glasfaser Holding GmbH
– Markus Hendrich, CEO of ecotel communication AG
– Michael Jungwirth, Member of the Management Board, Director of Public Policy & External Affairs at Vodafone Deutschland, Director of Public Policy at the Vodafone Group
– Michael Martin, CEO of 1&1 Mobilfunk GmbH; Member of the Management Board 1&1 Telecommunication SE
– Carina Panek, Member of the Management Board, Plusnet GmbH
– Karsten Rudloff, Managing Director, dtms GmbH
– Rickmann v. Platen, Member of the Management Board, freenet AG
– Soeren Wendler, CSO, Managing Director of Marketing and Sales, Deutsche GigaNetz GmbH
The biographies of the executive committee members are available here.
How diverse the VATM’s setup is becomes evident in the vote for the expanded executive committee, which includes the following representatives from VATM member companies:
– Stephan Drescher, Managing Director, envia TEL GmbH
– Dr. Christian Humpert, Chairman of the Management Board, DB broadband GmbH
– Dirk Pasternack, Managing Director, vitroconnect GmbH
– Christopher Rautenberg, Co-founder and Managing Director, metrofibre GmbH
– Dr. Michael Ritter, Sales Director of Strategic Alliances DACH & CEE, Colt Tech-nology Services GmbH
– Jörn Schoof, CCO/Managing Director, Unsere Grüne Glasfaser GmbH & Co. KG
– Felix Stiegeler, Founder and Managing Director, Stiegeler Internet Service GmbH
– Andrea Weber, Chief Legal Officer, Vantage Towers AG
– Mario Zöller, CTO, Tele Columbus AG
The biographies of the extended executive committee members are available here.
New Name, New Logo: Association of Providers in the Digital and Telecommunications Market
The general meeting on 15 May in Düsseldorf also decided on another change: for 27 years, the VATM has stood for fair competition and the necessary political and regulatory framework conditions in the telecommunications market. Now more than ever, it is time to shape the digital transformation and drive forward the digitisation of Germany. This task is at the center of all activities of VATM members from various industry segments, who together find their home only in VATM. For the first time in 27 years, the association is updating its name and will now operate as the ‘Association of Providers in the Digital and Telecommunications Market (VATM)’, previously known as the Association of Providers of Telecommunications and Value-Added Services. This is accompanied by a fresh association logo and a new colour scheme. “As a strong association with a presidium that reflects the entire market, we are looking ahead,” explains VATM Managing Director Dr. Frederic Ufer. “When it comes to the generational task of digitalisation, there is no way around competition. As an industry association, VATM is and will remain an important driving force for the new German government, for state politics and for the EU Commission in Brussels.”
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Valentina Daiber has been Chief Legal Officer and Head of Legal & Corporate Affairs at Telefónica Deutschland since 1 August 2017. In this role, she is responsible for legal, compliance, security and data protection, as well as the company’s regulatory work, relations with authorities and government agencies, and corporate responsibility and sustainability. She is also the head of Telefónica’s representative office in the German capital and Telefónica Basecamp in Berlin. Prior to that, she served as the Director of Corporate Affairs at Telefónica Germany, where she was responsible for regulatory law, antitrust law, telecommunications law and media law, as well as for cooperation with political bodies and associa-tions. Daiber joined Telefónica in Germany – then Viag Interkom – in 1999, where she started as a consultant in the regulatory department. Since 2004, she has held various management positions within the group. Before her career at Telefónica, Daiber worked at the Institute for European Media Law in Saarbrücken and for the former State Central Office for Private Broadcasters in Ludwigshafen. She passed her first state law examination at the University of Saarbrücken and her second state law ex-amination at the Higher Regional Court of Zweibrücken/Pfalz. Daiber has been VATM Vice President since March 2021 and is a member of the Bitkom main board and the Initiative D21 board. Daiber was born in Neunkirchen/Saar in 1967. She is married and has one son.
Wolfram Rinner has been Managing Director of GasLINE GmbH & Co. KG since 2016. The company is an investment company owned by ten long-distance and regional gas suppliers and has a nationwide fibre optic network spanning 28,000 km, which is being continuously expanded. As a reliable infrastructure partner in the German telecommunications market, GasLINE has expanded its leading role with a corresponding market share in recent years thanks to steadily growing network capacities. His strategic goal is to expand fibre-optic networks in Germany in a more commercially driven and sustainable way, and in his role at GasLINE, he works with passion and commitment to strengthen the role of digital infrastructure in the country. Rinner has been a member of the VATM Executive Committee since March 2021. He holds a degree in electrical engineering from the University of Stuttgart, specialising in high-frequency technology. Rinner is married and has one son.
We would like to thank our member companies GasLINE and Vodafone for their hospitality and friendly support.
