Germany’s Broadcasting Board elects DW’s new Director General

Peter Limbourg has been elected as the new Director General of Germany’s international broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW). Mr Limbourg succeeds Erik Betterman who has been at the DW helm since 2001 and has significantly shaped the broadcaster’s strategic direction.

Mr Limbourg is currently Senior Vice President of News and Political Information at ProSiebenSat.1 TV Germany. 

Valentin Schmidt, Chairman of the Broadcasting Board said DW will remain in good hands: “Peter Limbourg has outstanding qualifications to further strengthen Deutsche Welle as a modern multimedia company and Germany’s international media presence as a result. He is not only a first-rate journalist with an international background and excellent language skills, but also has extensive managerial experience in the media industry.”

Mr Limbourg said he will work hard to build on the current successes of the roadcaster. “To have the opportunity to play such a significant role in how Germany is perceived around the world is a challenge that I will make every effort to meet in the coming years. Together with my colleagues, I hope to further enhance Deutsche Welle’s journalistic standing and its multilingual and multimedia programming. Intensifying DW’s cooperation with Germany’s public service broadcasters ARD and ZDF is another goal I have set myself,” said Limbourg.

Peter Limbourg studied law in Bonn, after which he completed a journalistic traineeship at the German television news agency Deutsche Fernsehnachrichten Agentur (DFA) in Bonn and London. He worked as a reporter in Leipzig in the former GDR before becoming the Europe and NATO correspondent for DFA and SAT.1 in Brussels in 1990. In 1996 he became the Head of the ProSieben studio in Bonn, and in 1999 was appointed Co-Editor-in-Chief of N24 and Head of the Political Department at ProSieben, a position which he also took on at SAT.1 in 2001. In 2004/5 and 2008/9 Limbourg was the CEO of Pool TV, a joint venture of private television stations in Berlin. From 2008 to 2010 he was the Editor-in-Chief responsible for N24’s programming. He has been anchor of SAT.1 news since 2008 and Senior Vice President of ProSiebenSat.1 TV since 2010.

Limbourg is the jury chairman of the Media Award of the German Bundestag, a jury member for the Axel Springer Prize for Young Journalists as well as an advisor to the Media Commission of the German Bishops’ Conference.