WHU-Otto Beisheim School of Management
WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management is a business school with campuses in Vallendar and Düsseldorf, Germany. WHU was founded in 1984 by the Koblenz Chamber of Commerce. WHU is the abbreviation of German Wissenschaftliche Hochschule für Unternehmensführung. The patron and main financier of the business school was the late billionaire and founder of the METRO Cash & Carry Group, Otto Beisheim.
WHU maintains a global network of more than 200 partner universities, attracting exchange students from the US, Australia, China and many other countries, while also offering double degree programs with some partners such as University of Texas, Austin and the University of Western Australia.
Currently, there are 1,669 students at WHU, about 194 employees and 57 professors. The faculty includes the following centers: WHU Asia Center, Biopharma Management Center, Center for Collaborative Commerce, Center for Controlling & Management, Entrepreneurship Center, Center for European Studies, Center of Asset and Wealth Management, Center for Sports and Management, Financial Accounting and Tax Center, Henkel Center for Consumer Goods, Center for Market-Oriented Corporate Management, Center for Responsible Leadership and Wipro Center for Business Resilience.
Study programs
WHU offers the following programs. The language of instruction for the bachelor's program is English or German, while all master's programs are taught entirely in English.- Three-year Bachelor of Science Program which includes two mandatory internships and one semester in one of WHU's international partner schools.
- One-and-a-half-year Master of Science in Management Program consecutive to the Bachelor of Science program
- One-and-a-half-year Master of Science in Finance Program consecutive to the Bachelor of Science program
- One-and-half-year Master of Science in Entrepreneurship Program consecutive to the Bachelor of Science program
- Full-Time MBA Program
- Part-Time MBA Program
- Global Online MBA Program
- The Kellogg-WHU Global Executive MBA Program in partnership with Kellogg School of Management – Northwestern University, Evanston/Chicago, Illinois, USA
- Doctoral Program
- Executive Education
Tuition and selection process
The selection process for the undergraduate studies consists of two separate parts. Students are preselected according to their academic and personal achievements and are offered a chance to compete for one of the roughly 200 seats per year at the final selection day. During that day, candidates deliver presentations, interview representatives of the private business sector and go through mathematical tests.
Accreditations
All WHU degree programs are recognized by the German state and accredited by the Foundation for International Business Administration Accreditation. In addition, WHU holds accreditations from the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business and from the European Quality Improvement System. Together with ESMT Berlin, Frankfurt School of Finance & Management and the University of Mannheim, WHU is one of four German business schools to hold both AACSB and EQUIS accreditations.Rankings
WHU is widely regarded as the best business school in the German-speaking countries. It has been ranked first in Germany for 10 out of the 11 times it has appeared in the Financial Times Master in Management rankings, including five consecutive years between 2013 to 2017. The Economist placed WHU 3rd worldwide in its inaugural Master in Management ranking published in 2017. WHU has maintained its 1st position in Germany since this inaugural ranking. In 2019, Times Higher Education ranked WHU 3rd worldwide in its Master in Management ranking.In 2020, the Financial Times ranked WHU 1st in Germany for all its programs: MBA, Master in Management, Executive MBA, and Master in Finance. In the QS Business Masters Ranking 2020, WHU's Masters in Management and Masters in Finance programs ranked first in Germany and among the top 20 worldwide. In the list of business schools with most unicorn founders, WHU is placed 4th globally tied with INSEAD and behind Harvard Business School, Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Wharton School of University of Pennsylvania. It placed 6th worldwide in the Financial Times ranking of top MBA schools for entrepreneurship. Measured by the number of members on the Vorstand of a DAX company, WHU ranked 15th in 2019. The DAX is a stock market index consisting of the 30 major German companies.
WHU's joint EMBA program with Kellogg has been placed 1st in Germany in 14 out of the 20 annual EMBA rankings published by Financial Times since 2001. In The Economist ranking of EMBA programs in 2020, the joint Kellogg-WHU EMBA Program ranked 1st in Germany for the 4th time in a row and 4th worldwide.
Faculty
The faculty at WHU is organized into six groups: Finance and Accounting, Economics, Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Management, Marketing and Sales, and Supply Chain Management. As of July 2020, there are 40 full professors and 17 assistant professors at WHU who teach at the undergraduate and graduate levels and contribute to the business school's research output:Department | Chairholder |
Mergers & Acquisitions | Nihat Aktas |
Empirical Corporate Finance | Christian Andres |
Technology and Innovation Management | Holger Ernst |
Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Technological Transformation | Dries Faems |
Strategy and Marketing | Martin Fassnacht |
Monetary Economics | Ralf Fendel |
Macroeconomics and International Economics | Michael Frenkel |
Leadership | Fabiola H. Gerpott |
International Accounting | Martin Glaum |
Small and Medium-sized Enterprises | Christina Günther |
Economic and Social Policy | Christian Hagist |
Market Research | Walter Herzog |
Entrepreneurship and New Business Development | Christoph Hienerth |
Production Management | Arnd Huchzermeier |
Finance, Accounting and Taxation | Martin Jacob |
Sales Management and B2B Marketing | :de:Ove Jensen|Ove Jensen |
Empirical Capital Market Research | Lutz Johanning |
Organization Theory | Peter-J. Jost |
Family Business | Nadine Kammerlander |
Corporate Management and Change | Ayse Karaevli |
International Business and Supply Management I | Lutz Kaufmann |
Strategic Management | Jane Lê |
Financial Accounting | Garen Markarian |
Econometrics and Statistics | Michael Massmann |
Organizational Behavior | Miriam Müthel |
Innovation and Corporate Transformation | Serden Özcan |
International Business and Supply Management II | Felix Reimann |
Institute of Management Accounting and Control | Marko Reimer |
Finance | Markus Rudolf |
Management Accounting and Control | Utz Schäffer |
Digital Marketing | Christian Schlereth |
Sports and Management | Sascha L. Schmidt |
Operations Management | Liji Shen |
Logistics Management | Stefan Spinler |
Sustainable Urban Transport | Arne Strauss |
Services Marketing | Tillmann Wagner |
Logistics and Services Management | Carl Marcus Wallenburg |
Behavioral Finance | Mei Wang |
Industrial Organization | Jürgen Weigand |
Corporate Finance | B. Burcin Yurtoglu |
Student body
WHU student clubsStudents at WHU founded a large variety of student clubs. Among them are the conferences of the "Campus for..." - series:
- WHU - Campus for Finance
- WHU – Campus for Supply Chain Management
- WHU – Campus for Controlling
- WHU - Campus for Strategy and Leadership
- WHU – Campus for Marketing
- WHU – Campus for Sales
- 3 Day Startup
- WHU Charity Concerts
- confluentes
- Diversity & LGBT at WHU
- Enactus WHU
- Entrepreneurship Roundtable
- forumWHU
- WHU Music Club
- WHU Sports Club
- IdeaLab!
- In Vino Veritas
- SAIDA Consulting
- SensAbility
- SmartUp!
- WHU Students' Theater Group
- TEDx WHU
- Vallendar Integration Program
- WHU Finance Society e.V.
- WHU Debating Union
- WHU Euromasters
- WHU First Responder
- WHU GenerationsCup
- WHU Golf
- WHU Students Help e.V.
- WHU Walks for Charity
Honorary professors
- Paul Achleitner
- David B. Audretsch
- Klaus Brockhoff
- Karl-Ludwig Kley
- Peter May
- Bolko von Oetinger
- Mei Wang
- Axel Wieandt
Alumni
- Birgit Bohle, CEO of DB Fernverkehr
- Thomas Buberl, CEO of Axa Group
- Julian Deutz, CFO of Axel Springer, diploma
- Robert Gentz, founder and board member of Zalando, diploma 2007
- Armin Grossklaus, CFO of ATC Group / Oklahoma City, Detroit, US
- Michael Haenlein, professor at ESCP Europe, diploma 1999
- Jan Heitmann, poker player
- Andreas Herrmann, professor at University of St. Gallen
- Christoph Israng, German diplomat
- Philipp Justus, Managing Director of Google Germany, Austria and Switzerland
- Ulrich Lichtenthaler, German economist
- Matthias Muck, Professor at University of Bamberg
- Andreas Nick, Member of the Bundestag, diploma 1990, PhD 1994
- Matthias J. Rapp, CFO of TÜV SÜD AG
- Thorsten Reitmeyer, former CEO of Comdirect bank
- Oliver Samwer, CEO of Rocket Internet, diploma
- David Schneider, founder and board member of Zalando, diploma 2007
- Stephan Schubert, founder OnVista
- Margret Suckale, board member of BASF, EMBA
- Marco Vietor, founder audibene
- Axel Wieandt, German bank manager
- Saygin Yalcin, founder and CEO of SellAnyCar.com
- Oliver Zipse, board member of BMW, EMBA 1997