Bonn, 14.07.2023 The Board of Directors of the German Broadband Communications Association (BREKO) has bid farewell to its long-standing member Dirk Sasson, Managing Director of Stadtwerke Schwedt, and elected Fabian Bühring, responsible for telecommunications at Stadtwerke Neumünster, to the vacant position.

At a meeting of the BREKO Board of Management on July 5, 2023 in Berlin, Dirk Sasson, a long-standing member of the Board of Management, bid farewell. He is leaving the Board at his own request. On behalf of all member companies, BREKO Managing Director Dr. Stephan Albers thanked the Managing Director of Stadtwerke Schwedt for his commitment and the very good, trusting cooperation on the association’s Board of Directors. “I would like to thank all member companies for the many years of good cooperation and the trust they have placed not only in me personally, but also in our association,” said Sasson in his review. “As managing director of a municipal utility, I will now focus more on the energy transformation. As a board member and before that as head of the BREKO working group on fiber optics, I played a major role in shaping the path to FTTH technology and also motivated many other municipal utilities to follow this path. Today, I am proud to say that this was exactly the right way to go. Even if we still have some way to go before we have a nationwide FTTH network, the course has been set.” Even though Sasson is leaving the Executive Board, he and Stadtwerke Schwedt will remain members of the association.

In accordance with the Articles of Association, the Management Board members present elected Fabian Bühring, responsible for telecommunications at Stadtwerke Neumünster, as a new member of the Board. Bühring thanked the Board and named the topics in which he would like to be particularly involved: “I am very pleased about the trust placed in me by the election and look forward to working in a great team! In my work for BREKO, I would like to set two main priorities: Firstly, I will incorporate the special interests of municipal utilities into the association’s decisions. With over 90 members, municipal utilities are an important group within our association. I am particularly in favor of cooperation between municipal companies and with third parties – this is the most effective way to achieve long-term success in the telecommunications industry. On the other hand, I would like us as an association to look beyond the current topic of expansion and offer solutions for the effective and efficient management of our networks. To do this, we need to make strong use of open access and, in turn, cooperation in which everyone involved contributes their strengths. As Stadtwerke Neumünster – one of the first companies in Germany to operate pure fiber optic networks for many years – we can contribute with examples of what we do. In telecommunications, you are always a competitor and a partner at the same time – that’s what has inspired me for 22 years in this industry.”

The BREKO Board is now composed as follows:

President: Norbert Westfal, Spokesman of the Board of Management of EWE TEL GmbH (Oldenburg)
Vice-President and Treasurer: Karsten Kluge, Managing Director of Thüringer Netkom GmbH (Weimar)
Vice-President: Alfred Rauscher, Managing Director of R-KOM Regensburger Telekommunikationsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG
Other board members:

Fabian Bühring, Managing Director SWN Glasfaser Beteiligungen GmbH & Co. KG (Neumünster)
Stephan Drescher, Managing Director of envia TEL GmbH (Markkleeberg)
Thomas Eibeck, Managing Director SachsenGigaBit GmbH (Dresden)
Jörg Figura, Managing Director of DOKOM Gesellschaft für Telekommunikation mbH (Dortmund)
Bernd Gowitzke, Managing Director KEVAG Telekom GmbH (Koblenz)
Dr. Christian Humpert, Managing Director DB broadband GmbH (Frankfurt am Main)
Jens Prautzsch, Managing Director of Unsere Grüne Glasfaser GmbH & Co KG (Ismaning)
Wolfram Rinner, Managing Director GasLINE GmbH & Co. KG (Straelen)
Karsten Schmidt, Managing Director htp GmbH (Hanover)
Marco Sick, Managing Director of Vattenfall Eurofiber GmbH (Berlin)
Robin Weiand, Managing Director Westconnect GmbH (Essen)