Jennifer Morgan, SAP's new Co-CEO, newly enters the UNICEPTA CEO Image Ranking on the top spot. Media reports acclaim the "queen of the cloud", who succeeded Bill McDermott together with Christian Klein in October 2019, as the first woman at the helm of a Dax-listed company. According to Wirtschaftswoche, she is "Germany's most powerful businesswoman". The American's strategic guideline is to increase customers' success, Handelsblatt writes. At the same time, SAP wants to become "more efficient, earn more money and let shareholders participate in the success".
In the first three quarters of 2019, Theodor Weimer (Deutsche Börse) had stood unchallenged at the top of the CEO Image Ranking. He is not listed in the overall ranking as he did not reach the necessary media presence lately.
Strong business figures and forward-looking strategists
Last year's winner Kasper Rorsted (adidas) also achieved a top position in 2019: He is ranked second in the overall ranking. The Danish citizen again scored with good business figures. "The sneaker manufacturer is right on track", Handelsblatt quotes him as saying. 2019 will be a record year despite several challenges, he said. Wall Street Journal points out the positive development in the three strategic markets China, US and e-commerce.
Following his gigantic leap from place ten to three in the third quarter of 2019, Johannes Teyssen (E.ON) defended his good ranking in the final quarter. The media once again focus on the takeover of RWE subsidiary Innogy. Johannes Teyssen clinched this big deal, Handelsblatt comments.
Degenhart and Spohr join top 10
Elmar Degenhart (Continental) and Carsten Spohr (Lufthansa) made a successful final spurt. Both top managers join the top ten of the overall ranking on place nine and ten, respectively. Degenhart told Börsen-Zeitung confidently that Continental's stable sales performance despite a still deteriorating market environment is due to the company's "systems and solutions that are in demand worldwide".
Media reports acclaim Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr for the company's transformation. "Captain Spohr" is gearing towards expansion, Manager Magazin writes. He wants to "strengthen Lufthansa with new hubs, integrate additional airlines into the group and become the undisputed number one in European aviation on the stock markets."
For its CEO ranking, UNICEPTA analyzed around 33,000 articles published in German opinion-leading newspapers from January to November 2019 as well as articles from the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Economist. The ranking is based on the results of the UNICEPTA DAX Benchmark with which the provider of Smart Media & Data Intelligence continuously monitors the media presence of all DAX-listed companies, their CEOs, as well as the tonality of media coverage.