Influential People in Mobility

Change is taking place through business, tech and mobility. There are so many things going on and so many factors affecting mobility. To stay up to date, we’re following influencers and inspirational people who have a lot to say on these topics. You also want to dive deeper into the mobility sector, like Tapkey? These 14 influencers know it best, since they’ve been shaping the future of mobility for years. Side note: This list will be updated on a regular basis and is not yet complete. 

Mary Barra is the chair and CEO of General Motors Company and first woman to lead any major car manufacturer. She invested billions in electric vehicles, self-driving cars and a ride-share service called Maven to ensure the manufacturer’s future. With over 1M. followers on LinkedIn, she’s one of the top leaders when it comes to mobility. She was also listed as no. 4 of the most powerful women 2018 in Forbes.

Silvia Barcik is able to show a 22 years long experience in the automotive industry. As a specialist in urban mobility and transportation system for Latin America, she was responsible for the launch of sales of electric vehicles and the first two projects of mobility as a Service at Renault Brazil. She was selected as one of “19 Influential Women in Mobility” in 2019.

“Shaping the future of mobility at Byton!”, that’s what you read on Rainer Becker’s LinkedIn profile. He graduated in Aeronautics and now has a big experience in car sharing operations in Europe, Asia and the US. He focuses on urban mobility and car sharing, especially in China and Japan. 

Don Dahlmann is a successful journalist, author and consultant in the fields of future of mobility, autonomous driving, smart cities, IoT and AI. He has set up a new vertical in the field of Automotive & Mobility for the online magazine Gründerszene. In 2007 he founded the Racingblog, Germany’s largest independent motorsports blog. 

Entrepreneur and CEO at Vulog: Gregory Duconge has spent the past 15 years launching, growing and selling European and North American startups in the automotive, mobile and social media sectors. Before joining Vulog, Gregory served as the CFO of Powertrain System Business Group at Valeo. 

Jennifer Dungs is responsible for strategic investments in mobility start-ups and scale-ups at EIT InnoEnergy, a large European investor in sustainable energy innovations. She has worked in the automotive industry for over 20 years for companies, such as Ford, BMW, Fraunhofer, and Porsche. During her time at Fraunhofer as Director of Mobility and Smart Cities, she helped establish a joint lab with MIT called Ambient Mobility. 

Dr. Bita Sarah Haynes is Co-founder, Co-CEO and Chairwoman at Bolt Mobility. She was instrumental in the development of Bolt as a Science and technology company. She has worked in multiple sectors, including: micro mobility transportation and business development. Not surprising, she made it into the list of “19 Influential Women in Mobility” in 2019.

Dr. Daniel Kirchert is CEO and Co-founder at Byton and one of the most experienced executives in China’s premium auto industry. Before joining Byton, Daniel was managing director of Infiniti China.

Michael Kuhn serves as Senior Manager Mobility & Strategy in the Communications unit of Daimler Mobility AG. He has helped shape Daimler’s mobility services from the very beginning. Michael Kuhn established one of the first web-based collaboration platforms in the industry within Daimler’s Business Innovation unit. At the same time he was part of the team that created car2go. 

No stranger in the mobility sector: Dr. Karl-Thomas Neumann. He already worked for Motorola GmbH, Volkswagen AG, Continental AG and Adam Opel AG. Since 2018 Neumann has been Member Board of Directors at Navico, a specialist marine electronics company. The latest news: He joined  the startup Cartica AI as a consultant and investor. the company developed a software for autonomous driving. 

Sandra Phillips grew up in Switzerland, studied computational linguistics, English and economics and moved to Vancouver in 2008. There she first recognized how low public transport was developed. In 2013 she found her agency movmi. From planning to implementation, movmi launches an array of new collective mobility services. Furthermore, she won the ideas competition “Next Visionaries” from BMW i and TED.

Susan Shaheen is a pioneer and thought leader in future mobility strategies. She is an internationally recognized expert in mobility and was among the first to observe, research and write about changing dynamics in shared mobility. 

Janelle Wang is the CEO and co-founder of ACTON. She was selected as one of “19 Influential Women in Mobility” in 2019 and was awarded Female CEO of the Year in 2016. But much more: She holds over 60 patents. 

Dieter Zetsche is a German businessman who has been at the helm of 9 different companies. Currently he holds the position of chairman of the supervisory board at TUi AG, He was the chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG and Head of Mercedes-Benz till May 2019. In 2008 he was awarded “Entrepreneur of the Year” by the German media. 

Do you know of any other leading mobility influencer who should be a part of this list? If so, please feel free to contact us.