• CEO Olaf Schroeder leaves the company
• In future, Robin Seckler and Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer will jointly head Sport1 Medien AG as Co-CEOs
• Realignment of the company into five profit centers, whose management reports directly to the two-member Management Board
• Editor-in-Chief Pit Gottschalk leaves the company

Ismaning, June 13, 2023 – The Management Board of Sport1 Medien AG and the Supervisory Board agreed on Tuesday to realign the company. Olaf Schroeder will leave the company with immediate effect. In the future, Sport1 Medien AG will be jointly managed by Dr. Matthias Kirschenhofer and Robin Seckler as Co-CEOs.

Germany’s leading multichannel sports platform will be set up into five independent profit centers:

• SPORT1 DIGITAL with the websites, online and social media offerings,
• the FREE-TV division with the TV channel SPORT1,
• the PAY-TV division with the two pay-TV channels SPORT1+ and eSPORTS1,
• the NEW BUSINESS division, for establishing new business areas, and
• the PRODUCTION division with PLAZAMEDIA GmbH, which will continue to be managed by Jens Friedrichs.

The management of the five profit centers will report directly to the two co-CEOs. As part of the changes, Pit Gottschalk, previously Editor-in-Chief and Member of the Management of Sport1 GmbH, will also leave the company. A successor will be announced shortly.

Bernhard Burgener, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Sport1 Medien AG: “The significantly changed general conditions make it necessary to realign and focus more strongly on the digital business and establish new business areas. We are looking forward to tackling this step with the new co-CEOs. With Mr Seckler and Dr Kirschenhofer, Sport1 Medien AG will in future be led by two experienced media managers.”

Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer and Robin Seckler say: “We have both known each other and worked together for more than a decade. As a team, we will now make Sport1 Medien AG more efficient and powerful. Together, we will drive change to release energy and creativity and strengthen our competitiveness. In addition to our established core business, we will focus on expanding our digital activities in the future and establish new business areas based on our high-reach platforms.”

The Supervisory Board thanks Olaf Schroeder. “Olaf Schroeder has successfully led SPORT1 through challenging times. We thank him for his many years of successful work and wish him all the best,” says Bernhard Burgener.

Olaf Schroeder took over as Chairman of the Management Board of Sport1 Medien AG (formerly Constantin Medien AG) in August 2017. In his role, he played a key role in expanding SPORT1 into a multichannel sports platform. Today, the company from Ismaning near Munich stands for high-quality live sports, proven sports expertise and well-founded and entertaining reporting in German-speaking countries.

Olaf Schroeder says: “I was able to lead the company with its dedicated team on its way to becoming a multichannel sports platform. I thank the Supervisory Board for this and know that the company and team are in good hands.”

The following are the short vitas of Robin Seckler and Dr. Matthias Kirschenhofer, who will jointly lead Sport1 Medien AG as co-CEOs with immediate effect.

Short vita Robin Seckler

Robin Seckler has been Chief Digital Officer of Sport1 Medien AG since February 2022. In this role, he is responsible for all of the Group’s digital activities and projects. His area of responsibility thus includes all strategic and operational activities of the SPORT1 MEDIEN Group in the digital sector, as well as PLAZAMEDIA GmbH in particular, as a leading content solution provider in the sports and entertainment sector.

Already in 1988, Robin Seckler founded his own software and consulting company. In 1996, he started at I-D Media AG, previously Europe’s leading online agency, as the Senior Vice President and authorized signatory. Starting in 2005, he was working for Deutsche Telekom AG as the Vice President Community Services in the areas of Social Media and IPTV projects. Afterwards, at Hubert Burda Media, Robin Seckler was responsible for the digital activities of the Burda People Group as Head of Online Strategy and Sales. In 2009, Robin Seckler joined ProSiebenSat.1 Media AG first as Head of Online TV Brands, and then as Director of Business Operations for the platforms: prosieben.de, sat1.de, kabeleins.de and sixx.de. Later, as a Managing Director, he managed various departments at wetter.com. In January 2013, Robin Seckler became Director Digital at Sport1 GmbH. In December 2013, he was appointed Managing Director Digital Products of the management team at SPORT1 and since then has been responsible for all the digital activities of the 360° sports platform. In parallel to his duties at Sport1 GmbH, Robin Seckler also took over as Managing Director Digital Products at PLAZAMEDIA GmbH from 2016. In 2018, he moved to the newly founded digital business consulting agency Chameleo AG as Member of the Board of Directors. Parallel to his role at Sport1 Medien AG, Robin Seckler will remain Member of the Board of Directors of Chameleo AG and will continue to be responsible for the overall digital orientation of the Group. Like Sport1 Medien AG, the digital business consulting agency is also part of the Highlight Communications Group and is positioned within the Group beyond its original customer business as a company for networking and cooperation between Group companies in the digital sector.

Short vita Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer

Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer was appointed Board Member of Sport1 Medien AG (formerly Constantin Medien AG) in September 2017. In this function he is responsible, amongst others, for the areas of Legal, Compliance, Finance and Investor Relations. In parallel, he continues to be Managing Director of Sport1 GmbH and Magic Sports Media GmbH, with a focus on marketing respectively.

Following his law studies at Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich, Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer worked as an attorney at an accounting and public law firm from December 1998 to December 2000. In January 2001, he joined the former DSF Deutsches SportFernsehen GmbH (today Sport1 GmbH) as a legal adviser and was appointed Head of the Legal Department of the TV broadcaster in February 2002. Parallel to this, he was Managing Director of DSF SportMarketing GmbH from mid-2002 until mid-2003. Since 2007, Dr Kirschenhofer, as General Counsel, was responsible for the areas Law, Regulations and Distribution and starting in 2010 also for the executive office of Constantin Medien AG (today Sport1 Medien AG). He left the Legal Department in the middle of 2013. Since November 2013, Dr Matthias Kirschenhofer has been acting as Managing Director of Sport1 GmbH (until the integration of marketing and sales in Sport1 GmbH in December 2019 as Managing Director of the former Sport1 Media GmbH), responsible for advertising sales.

About SPORT1 MEDIEN Group

Sport1 Medien AG is an internationally operating media company based in Ismaning, near Munich, Germany. With its subsidiaries Sport1 GmbH, Magic Sports Media GmbH, Match IQ GmbH, PLAZAMEDIA GmbH and Jackpot50 GmbH, SPORT1 MEDIEN Group covers the entire value chain in the sports sector: SPORT1 as the leading multichannel sports platform in the German-speaking region with its TV, online, mobile, audio und social media channels, MAGIC SPORTS MEDIA as a marketing company in the betting, poker and casino sectors, Match IQ as the full-service sports event and consulting agency for associations, leagues and clubs for internationalization, match day management and the organization of friendly matches, tournaments, training camps and trips abroad, PLAZAMEDIA as the leading content solutions provider in the sports and entertainment area for all media channels and Jackpot50 as a platform operator of virtual slot games. This market positioning offers unique opportunities for customers and partners, including advertising companies and agencies, media houses, platform providers, sports associations, leagues and clubs.

Further information on the SPORT1 MEDIEN Group is available on the Group website at www.sport1-medien.de.