Speaker details

Biography

Dr Frank Kohls is an admitted lawyer, certified specialist for labor law and works as Senior Counsel in the legal department at IBM Deutschland GmbH. Since Dr Kohls joined IBM in 2002 he held various management positions, mostly in the field of employment law. 2017 he was for three years assigned to Zurich and headed the legal department of IBM Switzerland. Already being responsible for labour law in Europe, since 2020 he is Lead Lawyer responsible for employment law for Europe and Middle East Africa. Dr Kohls studied law in Freiburg and Munich. He worked as an assistant at the Max Plank Institute for Foreign and International Criminal Law and began his career at a law firm specialised in appeal cases in civil laws. During this time, he qualified as certified specialist for labor law. 1999 he moved to the legal department of an international Container Line as in-house counsel before joining IBM in 2002. Dr. Kohls is a founding member of the Federal Association of Labor Lawyers in Companies (BVAU) in Germany and co-head of its Southwest regional group. Since 2019 he is part of the legal working group of the platform Industry 4.0, initiated by the Ministry of Economical affairs. He regularly gives lectures on labor law in international context.