Christian Kaeser (Siemens, Germany) – on integrating virtual and physical worlds

Published: July 5, 2022, 2:45 p.m.

Among others we covered the following topics. 

  • Lobbying the right things only.
  • Has Christian made a family tree? Any relations in the family to cheese making? 
  • Why did Christian go against his father’s (also a lawyer) wish not to study law? And why tax law?
  • What makes Christian happy? 
  • Why Christian hates Twitter and business books?
  • Christian told about his podcasting experience (in German) – it is available here: https://open.spotify.com/show/2hWBK0xOAmVhR5003nFPj7?si=d04c24fb0c154c7b
  • What Siemens products does he have at home?
  • What is now going on at Siemens with all the virtual madness – NFTs, virtual currencies, metaverses, AI, robots?
  • How does the Russian war in Ukraine impact the work? 
  • How does ESG affect the business of Siemens?
  • WTS international tax network originated from Siemens tax dptm. How does Christian see pros and cons of WTS comparing to Big4s? 
  • How does a great external tax advisor look like? 
  • IFA Germany this year is hosting the global congress this September (gathering ~2k tax professionals from around the world). Christian gave us a great teaser for those still considering if to go.
  • Of course, there was a short tax related story as well.
  • We also spoke about a German village Norderfriedrichskoog, which for some 10 years until 2004 did not apply local business tax. (BTW, if anyone would like to practice longer German words, please have a look at this video of Christoph Waltz Gives Jimmy Fallon a German Words Quiz: https://youtu.be/F0jr-HQeT74)
  • How much in reality business decisions at Siemens, but also within multinationals in general are taken based on tax incentives or loopholes? 
  • Does Christian think it’s possible to reform the tax systems so they become really simple? 
  • And, like all the guests, also Christian gave his version of meaning of life. 


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