Ulrike Sapiro appointed Managing Director of the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation

Brussels, 26 January 2025 – Ulrike Sapiro has joined the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation as Managing Director.

Her appointment comes just weeks after the official launch of the Foundation, which was created through the joining of forces of the Jacques Delors Institutes in Paris, Brussels, and Berlin and Friends of Europe.

The Foundation brings together Pan European multidisciplinary policy expertise, advocacy and outreach, and citizen engagement across multiple European capitals. The Foundation aims to operate at the scale required to address today’s complex geopolitical challenges.

Ulrike will be responsible, together with the Foundation’s Governing Board, for developing an integrated approach to the work of the Jacques Delors Institutes and Friends of Europe. In doing so, she will support the implementation and operationalisation of the Foundation’s strategy, building on our respective expertise and networks, further strengthening also our advocacy, citizen engagement and collective impact.

“I am very excited to join the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation at such a pivotal time. With the combined strengths of the Jacques Delors Institutes and Friends of Europe, we have a unique opportunity to create greater impact in revitalising the European project and I look forward to working with the teams, the board and our partners.”

Ulrike comes from the private sector, most recently from Henkel AG, where she was Chief Sustainability Officer for nearly five years, reporting to the Executive Management Team and leading a team of 50 people to shape strategy, business integration, data systems, and reporting. Previous steps include international roles at The Coca-Cola Company and RWE Thames Water, where she was based in various European locations. She spent many years in the European and global policy space, including in Brussels, engaging on key topics such as public-private partnerships, climate and the energy transition, circular economy, and human rights. Ulrike is a German National, who calls Brussels her home.

Pascal Lamy, co-founder of the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation and coordinator of the Jacques Delors Institutes: “Ulrike brings her experience and leadership to serve the new Foundation’s overarching ambition: to build on and carry forward Jacques Delors’ political and intellectual legacy, and to help restore meaning, confidence, and renewed momentum to the European project at a time when it is being profoundly tested.”

Isabelle Durant, Friends of Europe’s President and member of the Governing Board of the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation: “Ulrike’s arrival comes at a pivotal moment for Friends of Europe. Twenty-five years after our creation, our unique identity, combining think-tank expertise, advocacy, and convening power, is more relevant than ever in a Europe that is being challenged and threatened in a rapidly changing world. More than ever, our role is to help make Europe stronger, more resilient, and fairer. We will now pursue this mission hand in hand with the Jacques Delors Institutes, under Ulrike’s leadership”.

Geert Cami, co-founder and Secretary-General of the Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation: “Ulrike will skilfully harness our respective strengths and complementarities to deliver on the ambition that guided the launch of this new Foundation: to scale up our organisations’ impact and reach, and to mobilise the full spectrum of collective forces, at the service of a Europe that delivers for its citizens and companies.”

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The Jacques Delors Friends of Europe Foundation unites Friends of Europe and the Jacques Delors Institutes in Paris, Brussels and Berlin. Together, we form a pan-European hub bringing over 25 years of top-tier convenings, public outreach and policy innovation. We are independent, innovative, multi-disciplinary, non-party political. We fuse bold ideas with civic engagement to accelerate Europe’s response to global challenges.