On October 7, 2020, the Austrian Business Travel Association caught up with the general assembly that had been postponed due to the lockdown and elected a new board. Andreas Gruber, Head of Travel Management CEE at Siemens AG Austria, was re-elected President. Marion Würtz-Schmiedberger (Cargo-Partner GmbH) and Angela Lille (Erste Group) are new to the Presidium.

The vice presidents Sabine Toplak (Accor Hotels) and Markus Grasel were confirmed in their offices. Other members of the board are Monika Milde, Travel Manager at Wolf Theiss Rechtsanwälte GmbH and CoKG, (Treasurer) and Marion Würtz-Schmiedberger, Assistant Management / Travel Management at Cargo-Partner GmbH (Secretary). The extended board (eight members) includes Alexander Schnecke (Austrian Airlines), Roman Brauner (Hertz), Markus Emhofer (Amadeus Austria Marketing), Klaus Kretz (European Travel Insurance), Peter Tolinger (Verkehrsbüro Business Travel) and Angela Lille (Erste Group) . As before, Wilfried Kropp (Kropp Kommunikation) and Christa Thomasser (formerly Infineon) are available to the Management Board in an advisory capacity. The general assembly was moderated by Hannes Schwarz, Managing Director HRS Austria.

"We are facing the challenges of this difficult time for the business travel industry with confidence, but the current situation cannot prevent us from making plans for the future - that is why we have already drawn up a complete annual program for 2021," he said in his role again confirmed President Andreas Gruber, after the election in the Hotel MAXX by Steigenberger Vienna. “Holding the general assembly in person - in strict compliance with all official regulations - has shown us how important human-to-human communication is for our members. The personal exchange of opinions at an event on site is irreplaceable despite all the technical progress. Until the "so-called normality", however, we will try to hold current topics, interesting and worth knowing via webinars. As we saw in the subsequent Business Travel Lounge, there is a great need for knowledge, information and personal exchange of experiences among our members. The opportunity to discuss current issues with professionals and other travel managers and the opportunity to

Networking, abta offers all of this as the most important communication platform for the Austrian business travel industry and will hopefully be able to do this again next year, ”said Gruber.