Dr. Sebastian Schäfer Hands Over the Reins to Alice Rettig as the New Managing Director at TechQuartier

Written

July 09, 2024

Author

Alice Bucher

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Frankfurt am Main, July 9, 2024 – Starting on September 1, Alice Rettig will take over as Managing Director of TechQuartier in Frankfurt. After eight successful years as Managing Director of TechQuartier (TQ), the leading innovation and fintech hub in Frankfurt Rhein-Main and Hesse, Dr. Sebastian Schäfer will take over the management of the House of Finance & Tech in Berlin in fall 2024.

Under Dr. Schäfer's leadership, TechQuartier became a central hub for the digital and green transformation in the financial sector, providing a platform for startups, established companies, investors, and academics to collaboratively develop innovative solutions.

Since its inception in 2016, TechQuartier has built a strong community of over 600 startups. Through a variety of programs, the collaboration between corporations and startups has been significantly fostered, enhancing the overall innovation power of Frankfurt’s FinTech scene.

Dr. Michael Reckhard, a member of the management board at the Economic and Infrastructure Bank of Hessen (WIBank), one of TQ’s founding members, commented: “I would like to personally thank Dr. Sebastian Schäfer for his outstanding work and dedication. He has made TQ one of Germany's leading innovation and fintech hubs, significantly contributing to strengthening Frankfurt's financial center and enriching the innovation ecosystem overall. We wish him all the best in his future endeavors and look forward to continued close collaboration between the innovation ecosystems of Frankfurt and Berlin.”

About Alice Rettig

The new Managing Director, Alice Rettig, is an experienced project leader passionate about driving transformation and organizational change in both startups and established companies. Since February 2023, she has been part of TechQuartier, most recently serving as Chief Innovation Officer. Previously, she spent six years in academia, researching and teaching corporate innovation and startup acceleration, and leading program management at a Berlin accelerator.

I am grateful for this opportunity and the trust from our shareholders and the TQ team. As Managing Director, I will continue to pursue the path I have already taken at TQ over the past 1.5 years and drive forward the strategic focus on late-stage startup programs and open innovation initiatives. Our goal is to build on TQ's great successes, streamline our activities, and leverage our core competencies – the innovation expertise in the team, the excellent positioning in the ecosystem, and the strong collaboration between our international startup community and our corporate partners.

At TechQuartier, she was responsible for partnership management and revamped the program offerings with leadership, focusing on dedicated programs for late-stage startups and open innovation initiatives. In her new role as Managing Director, she aims to further continue develop TechQuartier and solidify its position within the ecosystem and beyond, emphasizing close cooperation between established corporate partners and the startup community.

Dr. Michael Huth, Vice President for Quality Management, Infrastructure, and Technology Transfer at Goethe University Frankfurt and Professor of Experimental Physics, added: “We are very pleased to welcome Alice Rettig as the new Managing Director of TQ. She is a recognized innovation expert who combines profound theoretical knowledge with many years of practical experience in corporate innovation. With her expertise and extensive network, she will further advance TQ’s development as a cross-industry innovation platform and sustainably strengthen the startup ecosystem.”

In addition to WIBank and Goethe University Frankfurt, the City of Frankfurt am Main and the Technical University of Darmstadt are also public founding members of TQ..