Our founder

Representing the fifth generation of the founding Bertelsmann family, Reinhard Mohn spent over 50 years of his active professional involvement with Bertelsmann building a business that now ranks with the top media groups worldwide. Coupling courage in the face of entrepreneurial risk with long-term vision and financial expertise, his life's work employs more than 98,000 people today.

He founded the Bertelsmann Stiftung in 1977 to address both sociopolitical and corporate policy issues. The foundation carries on the longstanding sociopolitical, cultural and social commitment of founding families Bertelsmann and Mohn, while working to ensure continuity within the company.

To this end, Mohn signed over 68,8 percent of his capital shares in Bertelsmann AG to the Bertelsmann Stiftung on Sept. 16, 1993, a transfer that did not include voting rights. Mohn's individual voting rights, roughly 90 percent of the stock capital, were transferred to the newly founded Bertelsmann Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH (Bertelsmann Management Company) on July 1, 1999. Today, the foundation holds 76,9 percent of shares.

The fact that this charitable foundation is now the largest shareholder in Bertelsmann AG is based on Mohn's belief that great wealth must be subordinate to the social obligations of ownership, as put forth in Germany's Basic Law.