Norimitsu Ito has taken over as CEO of Harmonic Drive SE in 2020. In addition, the Supervisory Board has appointed Thomas Berger as CFO and Peter Hantl as new CSO/CMO. "As the new Management Board team, we will adopt important, different perspectives in order to establish new, innovative business models with strong growth prospects," says Ito, formulating the new corporate direction.
Caption (f.l.t.r.): Thomas Berger, Gottfried Bertram (Chairman of the Supervisory Board), Norimitsu Ito, Peter Hantl
Since 2017, Norimitsu Ito has served as Chief Operating Officer of Harmonic Drive SE, since the beginning of 2020 as Chief Executive Officer. After a bachelor's and master's degree in Japan, he completed his education in 2000 with a master's degree in Business Administration from the Cranfield School of Management in England. Norimitsu Ito brings extensive experience from various positions in Asian and European companies to Harmonic Drive SE. After working in Germany, Japan and China, Mr. Ito joined the Limburg company in 2015.
Thomas Berger graduated in business administration at the University of Hamburg with a degree in business administration and brings over 30 years of management experience in the commercial sector to the company. In him, the Supervisory Board has appointed an experienced manager to the Executive Board with responsibility for Finance, Controlling, IT and Human Resources, who has been responsible for the entire Group in Germany and abroad in these areas for many years. Thomas Berger has been a manager at Harmonic Drive SE since 2002, most recently in the position of Chief Financial Officer.
Peter Hantl studied Industrial Engineering and Management, specialising in Mechanical Engineering at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern. He also holds an Executive MBA degree from Northwestern University - Kellogg School of Management, Chicago and WHU - Otto Beisheim School of Management in Vallendar near Koblenz. Mr Hantl is responsible for Sales & Marketing as well as Design & Development and has 15 years of experience as managing director in medium-sized manufacturing companies and 11 years as CEO of international companies whose majority shareholders are private-equity funds.