Evelyn Palla appointed new CEO of Deutsche Bahn

The Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bahn AG has appointed Evelyn Palla as the company’s next Chair of the Management Board and CEO. She will take office on October 1, 2025, succeeding Dr. Richard Lutz, who will step down by mutual agreement on September 30, as mentioned in Deutsche Bahn’s press note.

Evelyn Palla is the first woman to lead Deutsche Bahn

The appointment marks a generational change at the top of Germany’s state-owned rail group. Palla, currently Member of the Management Board for Regional Transport, will be the first woman to lead Deutsche Bahn. Since joining the company in 2019, she has held senior financial and operational responsibilities, and since 2022 has overseen DB Regio, where she steered the business through what the Supervisory Board described as a successful turnaround phase.

Born in South Tyrol in 1973, Palla began her career at Infineon Technologies in 1997 before moving to E.ON AG in 2003, with postings in Munich, Cologne and Milan. In 2011 she joined Austrian Federal Railways (ÖBB) in Vienna, becoming a Member of the Board for Regional Transport at ÖBB Personenverkehr AG in 2015 and Chair of the Supervisory Board of ÖBB Postbus AG. She moved to DB in 2019 as CFO of DB Fernverkehr and has since taken on wider executive roles.

The leadership transition follows an agreement reached in August between the federal government, the Supervisory Board, and Lutz to end his contract early once a successor was secured. Lutz, who has worked at DB for more than three decades and has led the group since 2017, leaves after implementing the “Strong Rail” strategy and initiating the S3 restructuring program across infrastructure, operations and profitability.

Werner Gatzer, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Deutsche Bahn AG: “With her outstanding operational and strategic skills, Evelyn Palla has proven her ability to complete transformation projects with success in her time at leading European corporations, most recently at Deutsche Bahn, which she joined in 2019. She has steered the DB Regio AG business unit from stormy weather to calm waters along with the many people involved, not least the employees who serve millions of customers every day. We are confident that DB can make a successful new start with Evelyn Palla at the helm, and that the agenda for rail customer satisfaction presented by the Federal Ministry of Transport can be implemented promptly.”