Stuttgart. The Supervisory Board of Mercedes-Benz Bank AG has picked the successor for the CEO position. Franz Reiner (51), who will take over as chairman of Daimler Financial Services AG effective June 1, 2019, will be succeeded at the same time by Benedikt Schell (48) as the new CEO of Mercedes-Benz Bank. Up to now, he has been responsible for the worldwide customer and digital strategy as well as for the transformation of the business models in his position as Chief Experience Officer. Daimler Financial Services will provide information about his successor in the near future.
Mercedes-Benz Bank is one of the leading automotive banks in Germany and closed the 2018 business year with record numbers. At year's end, it had more than 950,000 leased and financed vehicles on the books totaling 26.2 billion euro, which represents an increase of 9% over last year. More than one out of every two vehicles sold by Daimler Group is financed or leased through Mercedes-Benz Bank. In combination with direct banking, the financial institution has nearly 1 million customers.
Klaus Entenmann, CEO of Daimler Financial Services and Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Mercedes-Benz Bank: "With more than 20 years of industry experience, Benedikt Schell is a proven expert for customer trends in the automotive banking and mobility market, and plays a key role in the digitization strategy of our range of services."
Benedikt Schell holds a banking diploma and an MBA and joined Daimler as a trainee in 1997. Following positions in sales and marketing as well as in fleet management, he was appointed to the executive board of Mercedes-Benz Bank in 2013 with responsibility for the private and corporate banking business. In this role, he was also responsible for the management of the markets UK, Spain and France as well as for sales and marketing for the Europe region.
This means that the new executive board of Mercedes-Benz Bank will be comprised as follows, effective June 1, 2019: Benedikt Schell, CEO; Andreas Berndt, Operations; Ilka Fürstenberger, Sales and Marketing; Andree Ohmstedt, Finance and Controlling; Marc Voss-Stadler, Credit.
