Elektra A. Kountouris

CEO

Munich, Bavaria, Germany21 yrs 8 mos experience
Highly Stable

Key Highlights

  • 20 years of experience in global business leadership
  • Expert in AI-driven business model transformation
  • Award-winning executive coach and mentor
Stackforce AI infers this person is a MarTech expert with a strong focus on eCommerce and digital transformation.

Contact

Skills

Core Skills

Business Model TransformationGlobal P&l StewardshipExecutive CoachingOmnichannel StrategySales ManagementDigital Unit LeadershipEcommerceAdvisory Board MembershipGlobal Marketing LeadershipMarketing StrategyGlobal Ecommerce LeadershipRegional Sales LeadershipMarketing LeadershipMarketing ManagementTrade MarketingGeneral ManagementProduct Management

Other Skills

Global Cross-Functional Team LeadershipBusiness PlanningDigital StrategySalesDigital TransformationCross-functional Team LeadershipVerhandlungsführungStrategieBrandingSoftware as a Service (SaaS)Coaching & MentoringFührungskräfteentwicklungs-CoachingVertriebDEIChange Management

About

STRATEGIC STEWARDSHIP: ARCHITECTING BUSINESS MODELS & GLOBAL GROWTH Elektra is a Managing Director and growth architect positioned at the intersection of global commercial scale and disruptive technology. With a 20-year career bridging industrial excellence and Big Tech leadership, she specializes in transitioning legacy business models into agile, digital-first platforms. Having governed P&Ls exceeding $1.B and led cross-functional organizations of 300+ professionals, she focuses on leveraging AI and data to drive sustainable market share for global category leaders. Leadership Impact & Executive Competencies: Business Model Transformation & Scaling: She has a proven record of orchestrating the strategic shift of legacy assets into digital-first platforms. Global P&L Stewardship & Growth Architecture: She directs capital allocation and commercial strategy for high-value portfolios, navigating complex organizational consolidations to unlock untapped revenue potential. This includes securing multi-million in annual revenue with key partners and leading complex deal negotiations and achieving with team highest share in YouTube revenue in EMEA at Google. Global eCommerce Strategy: She possesses deep expertise in building and scaling global eCommerce businesses from the ground up, harmonizing global pricing and digital presence to significantly enhance margins and customer reach. Certified Technical & Leadership Expertise: She is a Certified AI/ML Professional and a Certified Executive Coach, blending technical governance with the ability to build high-performance, psychologically safe team cultures. Award-Winning Organizational & AI Acceleration: Recognized as the #1 coaching manager in Central Europe (2023), she has spearheaded initiatives to scale AI adoption within sales organizations. She is an expert in driving the cultural shift toward "AI Team Readiness," accelerating the integration of machine learning tools into daily commercial workflows. Cross-Sector Resilience: She has built high-performance, cross-border teams across the Automotive, Retail and FMCG sectors, fostering internationalization and strategic brand positioning for market leaders. Her leadership is underpinned by a rigorous academic foundation, holding an MS in Corporate Finance from Bocconi University and a Strategic Leadership credential from INSEAD. A true global citizen, Elektra has lived in six different countries and is fluent in six languages, enabling her to navigate complex international markets and lead diverse, cross-border teams with deep cultural agility.

Experience

The trade desk

Managing Director | GM, Global Enterprise & Vertical Growth

Jan 2026Present · 2 mos · Munich, Bavaria, Germany · Hybrid

  • Appointed to lead the strategic evolution of the Global Enterprise portfolio, governing high-stakes partnerships for category-defining brands across international markets. Architecting the intersection of programmatic innovation and AI-driven business models to secure sustainable competitive advantages in the Open Internet.
  • Strategic Focus Areas:
  • Open Internet Advocacy: Championing a transparent, privacy-first digital ecosystem at the Board level to provide an alternative to closed "walled garden" environments.
  • Vertical Growth Leadership: Directing specialized scaling strategies across the Automotive, FMCG, and Retail sectors to drive market-wide digital maturity.
  • Business Model Transformation: Integrating AI-governance and data-centric frameworks into global enterprise architectures to accelerate vertical growth.
  • Strategic P&L Stewardship: Overseeing capital allocation and commercial roadmaps for a portfolio of global market leaders.
  • Organizational Design: Building high-performance, consultative teams focused on long-term strategic resilience and cross-functional excellence.
Global Cross-Functional Team LeadershipBusiness PlanningDigital StrategyeCommerceMarketing StrategySales Management+53

Google

Head of Omnichannel & Enterprise, EMEA HQ✔️Transforming with AI B2B and B2C

Oct 2022Jan 2026 · 3 yrs 3 mos · Dublin · On-site

  • Leading the vertical of Multichannel and Consumer Brands worth $xbillion in yearly revenue across B2C and B2B Retail, Healthcare, FMCG, Automotive, Fashion and more. Supporting Partner growth through cutting edge AI technology along the ecosystem for a portfolio of +$Billion in revenue and across more than 200 partners.
  • ✅Built Vision & Strategy for the Vertical
  • ✅Building best AI skilled Sales Team with focus on team Culture and tools adoption (leading also Sales Culture for the mid market) scaling from 7 to 76% AI usage share within 3 months
  • ✅C-Level relationships and Joint Business Planning
  • ✅Winning share of wallet via growth proposition and pipeline rigor / winning highest EMEA share in YouTube growth
  • ✅Building digital maturity and navigating clients +30% to transformative growth and next level segment
  • ✅Successfully navigated teams through biggest organizational changes (org consolidation and AI upscaling)
  • ✅AI powered tools expert
  • ✅Google Sales Coach Certified awarded with Best Coach Award EMEA 2023
  • ✅Google.org Star-up Mentor
  • ✅EMEA sales excellence lead mid-market segments lead resulting in doubling management engagement , +13ppt in C Level interactions and +25ppt Joint Business Plan quality metrics improvement
  • ✅DEI - Diversity, Equity, Inclusion Cluster Lead and URG Mentorship Program Lead resulting in highest inclusion score in Cluster within EMEA
  • ✅Central &Eastern Europe Women@
VertriebDigital TransformationMulti-channel MarketingMarketing StrategyCompetitive AnalysisBusiness Development+17

Henley business school

Executive Coach, Mentor and VC/PE Consultant

May 2022Present · 3 yrs 10 mos · Remote

  • Cross Industry Mentor and consultant
  • Female Leadership Mentoring
  • Certified Executive Coach at Henley Business School
General ManagementDigital TransformationStrategieCross-functional Team LeadershipCoaching & MentoringFührungskräfteentwicklungs-Coaching+1

Conrad electronic group

CEO Digital Unit ✔️Building Europe‘s biggest B2B Electronics Platform

Apr 2021Dec 2022 · 1 yr 8 mos · Munich, Bavaria, Germany · Hybrid

  • Reporting to the Group CEO and heading ~1€ billion of Sales and 300 HCO for all digitally managed business in B2B and B2C @the biggest European Electronics Platform. Leading great teams in the areas of:
  • 1. Digital Sales & eCommerce
  • 2. Marketing (strategic & operational)
  • 3. Master Data Management, SEO and Content
  • 4. Corporate Intelligence & Predictive Analytics
  • 5. Webshop business and operations
  • 6. Innovation Management along the service and customer journey
  • Visit us@
  • Conrad.de and all country sites
  • Conrad.com
  • Voelkner.de
  • Digitalo.de
  • SMDV.de
  • getgoods.com
  • ✅ Successfully consolidated the newly formed Digital Unit with Conrad SE & ReIn GmbH
  • ✅Build the target vision of seamless customer journey by introducing the strategy of flywheel benefits evolving around data driven offer towards personalization
  • ✅Successfully cleaned and structured data to introduce CLV and transparency on cost per new customer
  • ✅Focus on internationalization increasing the share by approximately 15%
  • ✅Strengthened eCommerce set-up introducing tools for enhanced onsite personalization
  • ✅Created and Introduced new Customer Excellence organization with new customer loyalty business case and concept
  • ✅New marketing set-up focusing on long term campaigns and Omni channeling
  • ✅Introduced overarching digital products roadmap, achieving within one year 100% international customer overview, enhanced personalization, 1content for all offering (marketplace and direct), 3 new digitized services evolving around subscription/rental
  • ✅Built with purchasing task force for main brand focus beating 2022 competitors sales
  • ✅Achieved with my great teams 2021 the stretch target beating also 2020 results
  • ✅YoY approx. +20% increase of AOV
  • ✅Increased B2B traffic by 50%
  • ✅Achieved the best B2C results with more than 25% increase compared to prior 5 years (exc. 2020), whilst maintaining margins above budget
  • ✅Introduced first int‘l consolidated FC for all legal entities on sales, channel and margin level
eCommerceVertriebDigital TransformationMulti-channel MarketingMarketing StrategyCompetitive Analysis+13

Messe frankfurt gmbh

2 roles

Member of the Advisory Board Automechanika

Mar 2019Mar 2021 · 2 yrs · Frankfurt, Hessen, Deutschland · On-site

  • Board Member representing Schaeffler amongst 12 leading Members in the Automotive Supplier Space
Automotive AftermarketAutomotiveInternational BusinessStrategic AlliancesStrategieAdvisory Board Membership

Member of the Advisory Board Digital

Mar 2019Mar 2021 · 2 yrs · Frankfurt, Hessen, Deutschland · On-site

  • Digital Advisory
Change ManagementDigital StrategyDigital TransformationAdvisory Board Membership

Schaeffler

Global VP Marketing & Communications | Member of the Global Leadership Team✔️Automotive Solutions

Jan 2019Mar 2021 · 2 yrs 2 mos · Frankfurt Am Main Area, Germany

  • Disciplinary and functional lead of the global and regional marketing and communications teams comprising:
  • 1. Brand & Portfolio Management
  • 2. Omni-channel & Digital Marketing
  • 3. Campaign & Sales Promotion Management
  • 4. Communications, Content Strategy and PR
  • 5. Marketing professionals in the Regions and Areas
  • 6. Team scope of approximately 70 people and approx. 20 million EUR budget responsibility
  • Main Achievements:
  • Successfully defined a vision, mission and strategy with milestones transforming towards omni-channel marketing
  • Successfully defined and implemented the new communications and branding strategy to transition into unified branding and persona-driven digital marketing
  • leading the marketing digital requirements within the infrastructure teams Salesforce, SAP Hybris etc. into one connected commerce cloud along with AI usage for efficiencies
  • Business Owner for digital sales and marketing customer portals
  • Successfully set-up new budgeting structure and metrics on global level for transparency and KPI tracking UX/CX, growth and awareness
  • Successfully introduced Marketing Automation and pilots in Account-Based-Marketing and Marketing Enablement
  • Project lead for digital infrastructure connection to our International IKAM with the MISSION to lead the transformation toward digital excellence.
  • Defining and fostering Omni-channel Strategy approach and implementation (Fluid journeys) along with comprehensive campaign management
  • Strong know-how of “consumerization” approach in B2B
  • Defining and building use cases with artificial intelligence to step change further in efficiency and effectiveness in content and personalization
  • Successfully set-up agile teams and tool landscape (i. e. Jira, Confluence) for digital projects in E-CRM and on-line environment
  • Set-up Division External & Internal Communications enabling transformation and strategic stakeholder and shareholder (stock exchange) management
Digital TransformationMulti-channel MarketingMarketing StrategyOnline MarketingCRMBranding+11

Osram

5 roles

Managing Dir. Global eCommerce & digital transformation | Member Executive Global Leadership Board

Jan 2015Dec 2018 · 3 yrs 11 mos · Munich Area, Germany

  • Global Lead of the eCommerce and digital transformation Team from 0 to industry hero building up Accounts, digital Marketing, on-line Solutions and online sales for the Business Unit.
  • Main accomplishments:
  • ➢ Built up in a start-up approach eCommerce for the company and led the global eCommerce Sales, Marketing & Digital Development professionals’ teams
  • ○ Defined compelling vision and milestone plan of becoming Nr. 1 lighting on-line expert gaining global market share from 0 to 10% within less than 2 years attracting digital talent across the globe
  • ○ Defined eCommerce strategy with clear approach for marketplaces, direct eRetailers, B2B eCom platforms, Multi-Channel players and direct to consumer
  • ➢ Strong growth delivery, transforming the division towards leading on-line presence
  • ○ Won division growth award thanks to YoY growth of > 50% and >40 new eCom accounts
  • ○ Defined eCommerce strategy with clear approach for marketplaces, direct eRetailers, B2B eCom platforms and direct to consumer
  • ○ Improved through global pricing management the overall margin by 10%-points
  • ○ 3-years in a row Amazon category leader within automotive listing > 1´2 million items
  • ○ JD, the leading Chinese on-line eRetailer, awarded us along with only 5 other brands as B2B partner
  • ○ Achieved brand and portfolio exposure globally with > 1 billion users by building new PIM structure, Content, on-line campaign/CTA and shop in shop partnerships
  • ○ Created leading digital content gaining the German Stevie Award 208 (silver) for best web-content
  • ○ Successfully built a web-shop operating in 5 countries with 5-star rating
eCommerceVertriebDigital TransformationCompetitive AnalysisOnline MarketingInternational Business+10

CEO Region Central Europe | Member of the Leadership Board✔️Transforming Lighting Industry

Promoted

Apr 2013Dec 2018 · 5 yrs 8 mos · Munich Area, Germany

  • Regional disciplinary and functional lead of the Sales & Marketing teams in the Region DACH comprising the countries Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Slovenia. Responsibility and >EUR300Mil. sales accountability for the Business segments Automotive Aftermarket and Specialty Lighting OEM, Aftermarket (Entertainment, Medical, Semiconductor, Industry, Airfield) within the Region. Lead function establishing eCommerce and on-line development for the Region and Unit. Pilot for innovative LED-based Portfolio Solutions.
  • Also in Charge of the Global eCommerce and digital transformation.
  • Main accomplishments:
  • ➢ Disciplinary and functional lead of the regional sales and marketing teams for Automotive and Professional Industrial Lighting (Medical, Industrial, Entertainment, Cinema) over all channels (Aftermarket, OEM, OES) with direct report to the Business Unit CEO
  • ○ Headed a business > EUR 320 million achieving > 50% market share
  • ○ Generated growth above GDP for 9 consecutive quarters in a row
  • ➢ Successfully led and managed the overall business in one of the most competitive regions
  • ○ Sales & distribution strategy accountability with business development focus gaining double digit customer wins
  • ○ Build up regional innovation and key portfolio business plan and implementation generating triple growth
  • ○ Slashed costs by approx. EUR 1 mil. in SG&A thanks to centralized region operations
  • ○ Defined and implemented eCommerce strategy 1PL/3 PL resulting in >EUR 5 mil. sales
VertriebDigital TransformationCompetitive AnalysisBusiness DevelopmentInternational BusinessStrategie+14

Director Global Marketing Automotive & Industrial Lighting✔️Driving Innovation towards IPO

Promoted

Oct 2010Apr 2013 · 2 yrs 6 mos · Munich Area, Germany

  • Global disciplinary and functional lead of the Marketing team. Head of Marketing for two business units with holistic channel and top account responsibility - Automotive OEM, Aftermarket (Trade Wholesale, OES/IAM, Retail) and Display Optic OEM, Aftermarket (Entertainment, Medical, Semiconductor, Industry, Airfield). Budget and customer budget responsibility. Key performance indicator tracking and target setting.
  • Main achievements:
  • ➢ In charge of the Central global and regional marketing teams for Automotive and Specialty lighting solutions for all channels (Aftermarket, OEM, OES) with direct report to the Business Unit CEO
  • ○ Defined and developed SMART portfolio segmentation introducing also second and third brand strategy resulting in >EUR 12 million business and approx. EUR 1 mil. EVA
  • ○ Defined and implemented first holistic LED strategic campaign planning and launch resulting in > EUR 10 mil. Additional sales winning also promotion pool award
  • ○ In charge of globally all ATL and BTL activities for a budget >EUR 18 mil.; launched end-2-end campaigns also with particular focus to China reaching 15% from just 7% of brand awareness within 6 months
  • ○ Launched state-of-the art new packaging design and new product launches winning 2xReddot Design Award in product design; 2011 German Design award nominee “Designpreis Deutschland”
  • Built up for the first time a comprehensive Brand Awareness Survey to capture brand equity and Net Promoter Score implementation
  • Build up full budget and Organisation reporting transperancy for the Business Unit on a global level
Marketing StrategyBrandingInternational BusinessAutomotive AftermarketTeam LeadershipAutomotive+2

Head of Marketing Europe Automotive Aftermarket

Promoted

Oct 2008Oct 2010 · 2 yrs · Munich Area, Germany

  • Marketing lead for all Aftermarket Channels in Europe. Functional and disciplinary lead of the European Marketing Team. European launches, Category and Campaing Management. Special Product assignments
  • Main achievements:
  • Defined and launched the Automotive Category and POS System
  • Launched on a global basis an entirely new packaging concept
  • Build up a new portfolio range winning also the innovation award at the Automechanika
Marketing StrategyMarketing ManagementProduct MarketingBrandingInternational BusinessAutomotive Aftermarket+4

European Marketing Manager Retail✔️Launching Category Management

May 2006Oct 2008 · 2 yrs 5 mos · Munich Area, Germany

  • Pan-European Marketing responsibility and coordination for the Automotive Aftermarket
  • Successfully revised Category Management and value-added portfolio strategies -Portfolio mix optimisation via new market segmentation and end consumer targeting step-changing the sell-out growth on the main customers and markets -Project leader in regard to innovation and branding for the division
  • Direct co-responsibility for customers and strategic partnerships accounting for 80% of the channel’s sales
  • Up to 40% value added product sell-in growth via sales and marketing activities
  • Revision and implementation of retail concepts which led to increase sales by 30% and to acquire new customers
  • Budget responsibility and cost efficiency improvement by approximately 15% through synergic cross unit planning
Marketing StrategyMarketing ManagementProduct MarketingBrandingInternational BusinessAutomotive Aftermarket+3

Giv gmbh

Trade Marketing Manager✔️scaling wine distribution

Nov 2005Mar 2006 · 4 mos · Munich Area, Germany

  • Task of enhancing brand presence of premium wines in the German specialised trade
  • Developed budget and sales forecasts on a yearly and three-year basis
  • Extensive market analysis and marketing schemes to find and gain new sales channels
Marketing StrategyMarketing ManagementProduct ManagementKey Account ManagementRetailSales+1

Family business in medical services (bioneurology)

General Manager

Jul 2005Oct 2005 · 3 mos · Nicosia, Cyprus

Business DevelopmentMarketing ManagementTeam LeadershipGeneral Management

Bosch s.p.a.

Product Manager Europe South✔️Scaling the Power Tools Business

Jun 2003Jan 2005 · 1 yr 7 mos · Milan Area, Italy

  • BOSCH S.p.A., Product Manager Europe South Milan, Italy
  • ➢ Managing one of the main product accessories lines within the Power Tools Business Unit
  • ○ Accountable for 15% of overall business and accomplished 4 major new product launches on time and budget for the region
  • ○ Reached 16% sales increase for main product lines both in the B2B and B2C channels of responsibility
  • ○ Improved margin thanks to shift into new production location and consistent marketing communication
  • Coordinator for the integration of the Greek Headquarters into the region Europe South
  • Created brand awareness within a new target group as Project Leader
VertriebMarketing StrategyBusiness DevelopmentMarketing ManagementProduct MarketingProduct Management+1

Education

INSEAD

Strategy and Leadership

Dec 2024Dec 2024

Cornell Johnson Graduate School of Management

Business Management Institute — International Business and Leadership

Jan 2012Jan 2012

The Wharton School

Post-graduate degree — Marketing Finance

Jan 2010Jan 2010

University of Duisburg-Essen

Expertise — Category Management

Jan 2008Jan 2008

Università Bocconi

Master of Science - MS — Business Administration/Corporate Finance

California State University - East Bay

Post Graduate Certificate — International Business

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