Bernd Hake
Mr. Bernd Hake is a co-founder of Noksha Capital (NCAP) and currently serves as its non-executive chair, as well as an active member of its Investment Committee.
Mr. Hake started his career at PriceWaterhouse in New York as a consultant, where he supported the digital transformation of Siemens Medical Systems to SAP.
He joined Hugo Boss as Head of Global Strategy and Business Development in 1997, where he supervised the buyback of distribution rights from agencies to set up corporate subsidiaries to accelerate sales growth with franchise partners and globally recognized department stores. In 2004, upon successfully negotiating the buyback of the Shoes & Accessories segment from its licensed partner, he became the global Director of Shoes & Accessories. In 2007, he was promoted to the global Director for the BOSS segment (previously known as BOSS Black). Additionally, when private-equity firm Permira acquired majority ownership of Hugo Boss AG (HBAG), he was one of the integral members of senior management who liaised with the Permira-led Supervisory Board to create the 5-year growth strategy. In 2009, as the Managing Director of Hugo Boss UK, Mr. Hake was invited into the extended Management Board of Hugo Boss AG to advise all HBAG regions on how to execute the Wholesale-to-Retail transition.
During his tenure as Managing Director of the UK, between 2009 and 2013, he grew the business from £75m to £175m in Sales and enhanced the EBITDA Margin from 13% to 18%. From 2013 to 2016, as the Senior Vice President of the Europe, Middle East, India and Africa region (EMEIA) he grew the business from €1.4BN to €1.7BN, while restructuring the business from a country-specific model of operation to a region-specific business model.
In 2016, he was appointed to the Executive Board as Chief Sales Officer and was responsible for Global Sales. He supervised Hugo Boss‘s entire worldwide sales operations, customer analytics as well as customer service. He led the development towards a consumer-centric organization and developed the omni-channel services. Under his leadership, the business grew from €2.6BN to €2.9BN in Sales between 2016 and 2019. More importantly, sales from the Online channel grew from €62m to €140m (32% CAGR) over the same period.
From May 2022 until December 2023, Mr. Hake served as the CEO of Red Bull Consumer Goods in Salzburg, Austria. He is currently the CEO of Woom, based in Vienna, Austria.
Mr. Hake holds a Diplom degree from Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany.