Dieter Spethmann
 Dieter Spethmann    ( businessman) | |
|---|---|
 Spethmann in 1978 (in the middle, in black suit and striped tie) | |
| Born | 27 March 1926 Essen, Germany |
| Died | 1 February 2016 (Age 89) Düsseldorf, Germany |
| Nationality | German |
| Member of | European Round Table of Industrialists |
| Party | AfD |
German steel industry manager who attended the 1968 and 1980 Bilderbergs | |
Dr. Dieter Spethmann was a German lawyer and steel industry manager, who was CEO of the steel conglomerate Thyssen AG from 1973 until 1991. He attended both the 1968 and 1980 Bilderberg conferences.
Background
Spethmann was the son of the economic historian and historiographer of the Ruhr mining Hans Spethmann and his wife Margarethe.
Eduction
Since he had skipped a class in elementary school, Spethmann attended the Realgymnasium in Essen-Bredeney at the age of nine. He graduated from high school there in early March 1943. After that, Spethmann began an apprenticeship at Friedrich Krupp AG, which was interrupted by the Reich Labor Service and the conscription to the Kriegsmarine.
From 1948 he studied law and economics in Kiel, Bonn and Cologne.[1] During his legal preparatory service at the Essen Regional Court, he worked at the same time as a syndicate at the Gelsenkirchener Bergwerks-AG. In 1952 he passed the Major State Examination in Law and in 1954 in Cologne. He was admitted to the bar in 1953.
Career
After completing his studies, Spethmann worked for a short time in an Essen law firm. In 1952 he received his first permanent position in industry at Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG. His task was to renegotiate the foreign debt of his employer.
From 1955 he worked for August-Thyssen-Hütte AG (ATH), which had emerged from Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG two years earlier. There he was first assistant to the General Director Hans-Günther Sohl. In 1958 he became head of the Finance and Investments departments, and four years later he became a board member of Handelsunion AG, which belongs to Thyssen. From 1964 he was Chairman of the Board of Management of Deutsche Edelstahlwerke AG (DEW) until he joined the Board of Management of ATH in 1970.
In April 1973, Spethmann succeeded Hans-Günther Sohl as Chairman of the Management Board. He mastered the challenges arising from the first major steel crisis in Germany and in Europe. He diversified, modernized and internationalized the Thyssen Group. For example, he bought the US automotive supplier Budd, which was sometimes heavily criticized.
Under his leadership, sales at Thyssen grew from ten to 36 billion DM and the number of employees from 92,000 to 152,000. He left the Group in 1991 because he could not reach an agreement with the Supervisory Board on the succession and the future strategy.[2]
In 1974, Spethmann was elected chairman of the Iron and Steel Industry Economic Association and held this post with a short interruption until 1984. In this context, he advocated a joint solution to the steel crisis at European level.
Other activities
In guest comments in the Handelsblatt and the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) as well as in letters to ministers and decision-makers, Spethmann expressed his views on topics such as the euro and what he considered to be the wrong interest rate level in Germany.
Together with Franz Ludwig Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and Joachim Starbatty, Dieter Spethmann filed a lawsuit against the EU Lisbon Treaty in the Federal Constitutional Court at the end of January 2009, after Peter Gauweiler (CSU), the Left Party parliamentary group in the Bundestag and Klaus Buchner had already filed a lawsuit.[3] He also filed a complaint against the new laws, which had to be revised after the Lisbon judgment.[4] However, Spethmann's complaints on this topic were unsuccessful.
In the spring of 2013, Spethmann was one of the main draftsmen in the founding of the Alternative for Germany.[5]
He had a number of board positions.
Events Participated in
| Event | Start | End | Location(s) | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bilderberg/1968 | 26 April 1968 | 28 April 1968 | Canada Mont Tremblant | The 17th Bilderberg and the 2nd in Canada |
| Bilderberg/1980 | 18 April 1980 | 20 April 1980 | Germany Aachen | The 28th Bilderberg, held in West Germany, unusually exposed by the Daily Mirror |
References
- ↑ https://www.maglevboard.net/en/about/in-memoriam/44-prof-dr-jur-dr-ing-dieter-spethmann
- ↑ https://www.handelsblatt.com/unternehmen/management/dieter-spethmann-der-sonnenkoenig-der-ruhr-ist-gestorben/12915118.html
- ↑ http://www.eu-info.de/dpa-europaticker/145393.html
- ↑ http://www.abendblatt.de/politik/deutschland/article1190174/EU-Vertrag-Jetzt-kommt-es-auf-Horst-Koehler-an.html
- ↑ https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2013/04/17/afd-a17.html
