The board of the German AI Association is composed of entrepreneurs who work on a voluntary basis to represent the interests of our members. The board is at the head of the association and represents it together with the management in public.
Jörg Bienert
Chief Executive Officer
Jörg Bienert is an AI strategy consultant and CCO (a.i.) of Merantix Momentum GmbH. I. After studying computer engineering and holding several positions in the IT industry (Gerling, Accenture, Framfab), he founded ParStream, a big data start-up based in Silicon Valley, which was acquired by Cisco in 2015.
Jörg Bienert is a founding member and chairman of the German AI Association.
Dr. Annika von Mutius
Board member
Dr. Annika von Mutius is Co-Founder & Co-CEO of the HR Tech Startup Empion. Previously, she studied at WHU, earned a doctorate in mathematics and worked for a robotics start-up in Silicon Valley before founding her own company. She is the next generation of a family wire processing company. In addition to her professional activities, Annika is on the founding committee of the Future Council EXPO2035BERLIN – with the aim of exemplary implementation of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations Charter for the World Expo 2035 in Berlin.
Annika was recently included in the Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe list, is one of the Top 40 Under 40 according to Capital magazine and is one of the 15 most important AI pioneers in Germany according to Manager magazine. She has been a member of the board of the German AI Association since 2024 and is committed to improving the exchange between SMEs and start-ups.
Dr. Vanessa Just
Board Member
Dr. Vanessa Just is the founder and CEO of juS.TECH AG, a growing start-up and group of companies for sustainability in digitalization. She holds a PhD in sustainable automation and digitalization of business processes. In addition to her professional activities, she lectures at various German colleges and universities, including Data Analytics & AI at ISM Hamburg, and is an editor at Springer Verlag.
Dr. Vanessa Just is head of the North and North-West regional groups in the German AI Association and is particularly active in the Climate & Sustainability working group.
Dr. Robert Kilian
Board member
Dr. Robert Kilian is CEO and Managing Director of CertifAI, a testing and certification provider for AI systems. He is the founder of the data analysis company Beams, teaches at the Humboldt University of Berlin on the subject of AI regulation and is co-head of the AI Regulation Task Force of the German AI Association. He is also a member of the supervisory board at N26, among others, where he was responsible for all regulatory issues as Chief Representative and General Counsel from 2015 to 2020.
Robert Kilian was also a long-standing member of the FinTech Council of the German Federal Ministry of Finance and a founding member and first President of the European FinTech Association (EFA). He began his professional career in M&A at the law firm Hengeler Mueller.
Dr. Rasmus Rothe
Board member
Dr. Rasmus Rothe is an internationally recognized AI and computer vision expert as well as co-founder and CTO of the venture studio Merantix, which promotes the transfer of AI research to business applications. Under the Merantix umbrella, start-up teams can work on AI applications and thus create and benefit from a unique ecosystem.
Rasmus Rothe has been a founding member and board member of the German AI Association since March 16, 2018. His areas of responsibility include technological issues, political work and association development.