Libor Lochman to follow Johannes Ludewig as CER Executive Director

Libor Lochman was unanimously elected as new Executive Director of the Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER) by the CER General Assembly on 12 September in Bonn (Germany). He will succeed the current Executive Director Johannes Ludewig and take office on 1 January 2012. Currently holding the position of CER Deputy Executive Director, Lochman has not only extensive knowledge of the European rail sector and EU policy making but also knows the association inside out.

Libor Lochman, born in 1963 in Czechoslovakia, graduated at the Transport University in Zilina and has a doctorate in electronics from the West-Bohemian University Plzen. He has a strong background in Control-Command and signalling systems. Prior to his role as CER Deputy Executive Director and leader of technical affairs (2007-2011), he acted as director of the Railway Test Centre, a facility for testing European rolling stock, infrastructure and signalling components, in Prague (2000-2005). Since the beginning of the project in 2005, he is the coordinator of the ERTMS Corridor E.

Current Executive Director Johannes Ludewig, leading the association for more than nine years (from June 2002 onwards), will retire by the end of this year.

CER Chairman Mauro Moretti, Chief Executive of the Italian railways Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane (FS), stated that “with Libor Lochman, CER has gained a strong leader with excellent knowledge not only of EU policy making but also of the European rail sector. Moreover, Libor Lochman has tremendously contributed to the successful work of CER over the past years and I am confident that he will efficiently handle future challenges the rail sector is facing.”

Honouring the outstanding achievements of Johannes Ludewig over the past decade, Moretti said “Johannes Ludewig is the father of CER’s success story. Thanks to his enthusiastic and dedicated work, the number of CER members tripled from 25 in 2002 to 79 members today. A well-known and well respected personality across Europe, Ludewig has put his stamp on European policy making over the last decade. An era is going to an end and CER thanks him for all his achievements.”