[3] This body was responsible for the representation of industrial enterprises during the Nazi period and was subsequently dissolved at the end of the Second World War in 1945.
[4] When the Federal Republic of Germany was established in 1949, the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) was founded in Munich.
On 19 October 1949,[6] representatives of 32 trade associations and working groups established the Committee for Economic Issues of the Industrial Associations to counter the Allies' reservations regarding a regularly operating industrial umbrella organisation.
The board of directors is responsible for the affairs of the BDI insofar as these are not reserved for other bodies by law or the Articles of Association.
The other members of the executive board are currently the deputy managing director Holger Lösch, Iris Plöger and Wolfgang Niedermark.
[16] As an umbrella organization, the federation is responsible for the represenration and promotion of concerns of the industrial sectors it encompasses.
[18] As an advocacy group, its main role is to articulate the interests of its members and their industries, while it also engages in global lobbying on behalf of industrially active enterprises at the local, national and global levels,[19] and thereby is heard across all economic relevant legislative processes.