APG|SGA’s management team is being strengthened in the area of digitalisation and is realigning its focus

Dr Dominik Franke is to become Chief Information & Technology Officer

With effect from 1 September 2023, Dr Dominik Franke (pictured below) will join the APG|SGA management team, having been appointed to the newly created role of Chief Information & Technology Officer (CITO). From this date, Beat Holenstein will take over the Partner Market division from Christian Gotter, in addition to his responsibilities in the Marketing division, whilst Christian Gotter will refocus on his wide-ranging duties in the Logistics & Operations division.

As part of its market strategy, APG|SGA is making long-term investments in its operational capabilities with the stated aim of securing and expanding its market leadership in the analogue and digital OOH media market over the long term, within a changing environment. To reflect the ever-increasing importance of IT, data and adtech, a decision was taken to create the position of CITO (Chief Information & Technology Officer) at executive management level, a role which has been filled by Dr Dominik Franke. Dominik Franke (born 1984) holds a PhD in Computer Science and has 15 years’ experience in various roles within IT, digitalisation and digital product development, alongside a deep understanding of innovation and strategy. Following his degree and PhD at RWTH Aachen University, he was a founder and consultant and, over the last 10 years, has held various management positions at Tchibo and V-Zug.

In his new role, Dr Dominik Franke will, in addition to IT (development, operations, data science, Business Analysis & Process Management, IT Security), he will also assume technological responsibility for the further development of the e-commerce and programmatic platforms, as well as the mobile solutions (aymo), which were developed within the ‘Marketing & Innovation’ division and were previously under the remit of Beat Holenstein.

From 1 September 2023, Beat Holenstein will, in addition to his existing marketing responsibilities, take over the Partner Market division – previously headed by Christian Gotter – which encompasses the comprehensive, nationwide support of cities, transport operators, airports, mountain destinations, shopping centres and private landowners, as well as the procurement of advertising inventory. The new ‘Marketing & Partner Market’ division will serve as the hub within APG|SGA, responsible for product development, media research, marketing communications, programmatic and mobile sales, as well as product management, whilst also systematically pursuing new business opportunities.

As Head of ‘Logistics & Operations’ at executive level, Christian Gotter is once again focusing on the core functions of logistics and order processing, as well as the associated management of over 200 staff in this division.

Beat Hermann, the Group’s CFO, will hand over responsibility for the IT division to Dr Dominik Franke with effect from 1 September 2023. The recruitment process to find Beat Hermann’s successor is still ongoing.

Further information on the appointment of Dr Dominik Franke (career history)
Dominik Franke will take up the role of Chief Information & Technology Officer on the Executive Board on 1 September 2023, taking charge of the IT divisions (development, operations, data science, Business Analysis & Process Management, IT Security) and digital product development (e-commerce, programmatic platforms and mobile solutions such as ‘aymo’). From 2019 until he joined APG|SGA, he built up the Digital Products & Services division at V-ZUG and was responsible for V-ZUG’s digital products worldwide. Until 2019, he held various roles at Tchibo and its subsidiaries and sister companies. For example, he was responsible for setting up and leading digital product development for smart coffee machines (Qbo) in Zurich and took over as head of global IT at Tchibo Coffee Service in Hamburg. Prior to his time as a line manager, he worked as a management consultant at ComConsult, where he was in charge of the Competence Centre for Mobile Applications & the Internet of Things. He began his professional career whilst completing his PhD at RWTH Aachen University by founding the research-based spin-off Embility. He holds a degree and a PhD in Computer Science (RWTH Aachen & University of Limerick) with specialisations in Psychology (2009) and Economics (2011). Among his numerous professional development courses, he is also certified in ITSM/ITIL (2014) and the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) (2022).