Management Board

Dr Helmut Becker is CEO of ZEAL since 1 September 2015, after being Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for more than two years. He has been a member of the Supervisory Board of ZEAL since mid 2011 and Chief Commercial Officer of XING AG since September 2009. In this capacity he was responsible for Product, Marketing and Revenues divisions. Before taking up this position at XING AG, Helmut Becker was Senior Director Advertising and Internet Marketing of eBay Germany and Managing Director of eBay Advertising AG. Prior to these posts he was Managing Director of the eBay subsidiary Shopping.com Deutschland and Director Strategy and Corporate Development for eBay. He began his career as a consultant at McKinsey. Dr. Helmut Becker studied physics at the University of Hamburg and the University of Cambridge, where gained his PhD.

Sebastian Bielski, born in 1978, is Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the ZEAL Group and responsible for Finance, Investor Relations and ESG.

With a degree in business administration, his professional focus is on managing and ensuring all financial matters of the ZEAL Group as well as on financial management and financial reporting. Furthermore, he is responsible for the support and acquisition of investors. He is also responsible for the management and strategic expansion of the ESG division.

Prior to his career at ZEAL, Sebastian Bielski was CFO at the online credit comparison portal smava and Chief Strategy Officer at the online food ordering company Delivery Hero, among others. In total, he has more than ten years of experience in senior positions at high-growth, consumer-focused Internet companies and eight years of experience in investment banking and private equity.

 

Paul Dingwitz is member of the ZEAL Management Board since 5 June 2021, after being in charge for Technology Operations, Security and Engineering at ZEAL for more than five years. He has more than 20 years working in the technology sector and more than ten of those years holding executive leadership positions. Prior to joining ZEAL, he was Vice President of Technology for Rue La La in Boston as well as CTO of ONE Media Corp in Atlanta. He also held a senior engineering role at CNN where he helped develop and deploy the first online live video portal for the network. His background and expertise is diverse – across operations, security and engineering – all starting 1997 with Military service early in his career. He studied Technology Management at the American Military University (AMU/APU).

 

Sönke Martens is a member of the ZEAL Management Board since 1 July 2021, having previously been part of the ZEAL Group for more than seven years. He has been active in the digital industry for over 15 years, including more than ten years in a management role. Before joining ZEAL, Sönke Martens founded the startup loftville, an online real estate marketplace. Before that, he held several business development roles at New Work SE (formerly XING AG), most recently as Director Corporate Development. After completing a banking apprenticeship at Hamburgische Landesbank and studying business administration at the Catholic University of Eichstätt-Ingolstadt and in Buenos Aires, the business graduate began his career as a consultant at Roland Berger Strategy Consultants.