Ola Källenius

Sten Ola Källenius (born 11 June 1969) is a Swedish-German business executive. He serves as the Chairman of the Board of Management and CEO of the Mercedes-Benz Group. Källenius was the first non-German to hold both positions prior to obtaining German citizenship.

Early life Källenius was born in Västervik, by the age of one the family moved to Malmö, later living in various places throughout Sweden, Germany, and Switzerland. The family spent summers at Scania's countryside, where his father's family owned a summer house next to his maternal grandparent's farm. When Ola was 16, the family moved to Stockholm, living across the road from the Stockholm School of Economics. Before starting university, he completed his military service at Tolkskolan – the Swedish Armed Forces Interpreter School – which he called 'the most intense 15 months of my life'.

Education Originally planning to follow his older brother's footsteps in studying at KTH, Källenius instead graduated from Stockholm School of Economics with a master's degree, including an exchange semester at University of St. Gallen. He also earned aCEMS Master in International Management (CEMS MIM) and Finance and Accounting.

Career Källenius began his career in 1993 at the former Daimler-Benz AG, where he worked in the "International Junior Research Group". His first major project was in the finance team for setting up production of the Mercedes M-class at a new Alabama plant. Since October 2013, he has been a member of the executive board of Mercedes-Benz Cars and was responsible for marketing and sales. He became the successor to Thomas Weber, who had been responsible for this division since 2004. Britta Seeger succeeded Källenius as board member for Mercedes-Benz Cars Sales.

Källenius succeeded Dieter Zetsche as the Chairman of the Board of Management of Mercedes-Benz Group AG in May 2019. In 2023, Mercedes-Benz extended his contract until mid-2029.

In his capacity as CEO, Källenius accompanied Chancellor Olaf Scholz on a state visit to China in 2024.

Positions Källenius is a strong advocate of plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles within Daimler. He has pushed the new electric model initiative, product and technology brand EQ, along with a $12 billion investment into Mercedes-Benz's new line of battery-powered vehicles. Within the initiative he has proposed and advocated for a series of ten new and purely electric Mercedes-Benz models to be launched by 2022. The first car was the Mercedes-Benz EQC SUV, launched in the first half of 2019. In July 2023 Källenius obtained German citizenship. He is fluent in English, Swedish and German.

During his studies at the Stockholm School of Economics, he was a member of the Danderyd Mean Machines American football team.