Otto Wolff von Amerongen (6 August 1918 – 8 March 2007) was an influential German businessman, who chaired

Otto Wolff AG Otto Wolff AG was a German steelmaker founded in Cologne by the industrialists Otto Wolff and Ottmar E. Strauß in 1904. One of the largest businesses in pre-war Germany, it exists today as an independent subsidiary of the ThyssenKrupp group. His ...

, one of the largest trading groups in

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

. His father was industrialist Otto Wolff, his mother Elsa von Amerongen. On his father's death he became a board member and co-proprietor of his father's business, the Otto-Wolff-Konzern. In 1942, during World War II, he was sent to Portugal to handle import-export business for the firm. He was briefly interned following the Allied invasion of Germany but was given responsibility for re-establishing the company's export business in 1947. On the 1966 flotation of the business, Wolff von Amerongen became chairman of the board, a position he retained for the next twenty years. He held positions on the boards of other major firms. In 1971 he became a director of

Standard Oil Standard Oil Company, Inc., was an American oil production, transportation, refining, and marketing company that operated from 1870 to 1911. At its height, Standard Oil was the largest petroleum company in the world, and its success made its co-f ...

of New Jersey, later

Exxon ExxonMobil Corporation (commonly shortened to Exxon) is an American multinational oil and gas corporation headquartered in Irving, Texas. It is the largest direct descendant of John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil, and was formed on November 30, ...

. From 1955 he was Chairman of the German East-West Trade Committee, and served as Chairman of the Cologne Chamber of Commerce and Industry from 1966 and 1990. He was a member of the Steering Committee of the

Bilderberg Group The Bilderberg meeting (also known as the Bilderberg Group) is an annual off-the-record conference established in 1954 to foster dialogue between Europe and North America. The group's agenda, originally to prevent another world war, is now defin ...

. In 2001 he was awarded the

Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany The Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (german: Verdienstorden der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, or , BVO) is the only federal decoration of Germany. It is awarded for special achievements in political, economic, cultural, intellect ...

, 1st Class.

References

Grand Crosses 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany 1918 births 2007 deaths Members of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Group {{Germany-business-bio-stub