PUBLIGROUPE SA 
By Arndt Groth, CEO of PubliGroupe: "With Alain D. Bandle, Publicitas is gaining a top manager who will vigorously push ahead with the transformation of Publicitas amidst a dramatically changing media industry and reinforce central IT and digitalisation projects with his wealth of experience and key leadership abilities. At the same time, Alain D. Bandle possesses the necessary know-how to position the national and international network of Publicitas as a lean and effective media service company. I thank Beat Roeschlin for the initiation of numerous significant growth initiatives in the digital field and for the implementation of important optimisation measures over the last years and am pleased that he will continue to contribute to Publicitas in his former core area of expertise as one of the most qualified experts on the OOH market and that he will assist the new CEO with important affairs."
Alain D. Bandle: "I look forward to my new role at Publicitas. Network, sales and technology; these are the key ingredients that drive me to make Publicitas a leading media service company."
Alain D. Bandle holds a master's degree in business from the University of St. Gallen (lic. oec. HSG). The trilingual, internationally experienced manager worked most recently at Satmap, a USA-based company specialising in artificial intelligence, where he was responsible for the expansion of operations in Continental Europe. Previously he served as CEO of the Versatel telecommunications group in Düsseldorf, which he sold to the American private equity company KKR following a successful repositioning and turnaround in 2011. From 2003 to 2009, Alain D. Bandle worked at Dell. As Vice-President and General Manager based in Geneva, he oversaw Europe-wide business relations in the public sector, which constitutes Dell's largest and most successful business segment with sales volumes of over EUR 2.5 billion and 700 employees. Before that, he headed the Central Europe (DACH) division at Dell.
For a number of years, Alain D. Bandle has complemented his operative duties by serving in an advisory capacity or as a supervisory board member for various companies and organisations, such as at Kooaba, an ETH (Federal Institute of Technology) start-up company in the field of augmented reality. In addition, he has consulted companies and private equity firms in regard to ICTM projects as a senior executive advisor.
Numerous important IT projects at Publicitas
Publicitas is currently undergoing major changes and has been in the red for several years. For 2012 as well, Publicitas will report a negative operating result. At the Investors' Day in December 2012, PubliGroupe forecast an operating loss of CHF 22 million for Publicitas, which turned out to be lower in the end due to successes achieved in restructuring and winning back customers in the final weeks of the year.
The company is transforming from a traditionally print-dominated player with a decidedly sales-oriented, decentralised orientation into an increasingly digital service and outsourcing provider for the media industry. Publicitas is further investing in a new IT processing infrastructure and tool landscape. By 2014, Publicitas will be running its operations for all types of media, in Switzerland and abroad, on a new, highly flexible software solution that will act as the end-to-end digitalisation backbone. The underlying cloud technology represents a key factor enabling reduction of deployment and operating costs, as well as speeding up implementation of business requirement changes.
Going forward, Publicitas will strive for further diversification of its product portfolio. These efforts include strengthening of the out-of-home segment, which is already being marketed in various regions of Switzerland via cooperation agreements with third parties and which also plays an important role abroad, especially for Publicitas in India.
A photo of Alain D. Bandle is also available for download at www.publigroupe.com.
For further information:
PubliGroupe AG
Beat W. Werder
Head of Corporate Communications
Tel.: + 41 21 317 72 15
E-Mail: bwerder(at)publigroupe.com
PubliGroupe AG
Avenue Mon-Repos 22
CH-1002 Lausanne
Tel. + 41 21 317 71 11
Fax + 41 21 317 75 55
info(at)publigroupe.com
www.publigroupe.com
Professional background of Alain D. Bandle
After completing a master's programme in business at the University of St. Gallen, Alain D. Bandle began his professional career at Procter & Gamble in Geneva and in Frankfurt. This was followed by nine years in various management positions at Hewlett Packard in Geneva and Zurich.
In 1993, he joined the management of Swissair as Vice-President Products and Distribution before returning to Hewlett Packard in 1996 as General Manager Germany/Switzerland.
Two years later, Bandle was appointed to the managing board of VEBA AG where - as chairman of the supervisory board of E-Plus and o-tel-o and a member of the supervisory board of Bouygues Telecom - he oversaw the group's telecommunications business, which he successfully divested before VEBA merged with VIAG to become Eon.
From the turn of the millennium through 2003, Bandle served as Chief Executive Officer of the "you-swiss private banking" e-banking project of Bank Vontobel and subsequently the software company Fantastic.
In the years from 2001 to 2007, he contributed his expertise as a member of the advisory board of Austrian Airlines and from 2001 to 2003 of yellowworld, the e-business venture of the Swiss Post.
In November 2003, Bandle took over the management of Dell in Switzerland. One and a half years later, Bandle also assumed responsibility for the management of Dell in Germany and Austria and in November 2006 was appointed Vice-President and General Manager for Dell Central Europe. As Vice-President and General Manager Public Segment Europe, he oversaw Europe-wide business relations in the public sector, which constitutes Dell's largest business segment with sales volumes of over EUR 2.5 billion.
In 2009, he became CEO of Versatel AG in Düsseldorf, the third-largest alternative telecommunications company in Germany, which he repositioned and successfully sold to KKR in fall 2011.
Since 2011, Bandle served as Chairman European Operations of Satmap Inc. (www.satmapinc.com), a company specialised in personality matching technology for call centres based on artificial intelligence, where he was responsible for its expansion in Continental Europe.
He is also member of the supervisory board of Kooaba AG (www.kooaba.com), an ETHZ (Federal Institute of Technology Zurich) start-up in the field of mobile image recognition, visual search and augmented reality. In addition, he consults companies and private equity firms in regard to ICTM projects as a senior executive advisor.
Bandle is a regular guest lecturer for the Executive MBA programme of the University of St. Gallen.
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