Dieter Kempf was born in Munich in 1953.

After studying business administration from 1973 to 1978 in Munich, he worked at Arthur & Young (now Ernst & Young) from 1978 to 1991, becoming a partner in 1989.

He then joined Datev in Nuremberg in 1991 as a Board Member, responsible for product and software development. From 1992 onwards, he served as Deputy Chairman of the Board. In 1996, he became Chairman, a position he held until March 2016. During Kempf’s time at Datev, the company grew to one of Europe’s largest IT service providers.

From 2011 to 2015, Kempf served as President of BDI’s member association Bitkom (Federal Association for Information Technology, Telecommunications and New Media). During this time, he was also Vice President of the BDI.

Dieter Kempf was unanimously elected President of BDI as of January 2017.

In addition, Kempf serves on various supervisory boards and advisory boards. He was made honorary professor of Friedrich- Alexander University of Erlangen-Nürnberg in 2005.