RTL Zwei
RTL Zwei is a German private broadcaster from the second founding wave, after the TV market in Germany was opened up to private providers. It is one of the few remaining TV stations that is not majority-owned by a large media group. The channel has become known for its reality formats and casting shows, with which it serves a young target group. Nevertheless, the station offers a full programme, i.e. it serves different age groups and also has an information and news programme. However, the main news programme, RTL Zwei News, is no longer produced in-house, but by a joint newsroom at RTL Germany. The channel can be received in Germany, Austria and Switzerland and also serves the different markets in the advertising blocks.
Audience Share
2.51%
Ownership Type
private
Geographic Coverage
International
Content Type
free content
Media Companies / Groups
RTL Deutschland
Bertelsmann
Ownership Structure
RTL Zwei is owned by RTL Group (represented by the shareholders CLT-UFA Germany GmbH and RTL Television GmbH) with 35.9% of the shares, Heinrich Bauer Verlag (31.5%), Tele München Gruppe (31.5%) and Hubert Burda Medien (1.1%). The shares held by the Bertelsmann Foundation (via RTL Group) are attributed to the Mohn family, as they have extensive powers and control within the foundation.
Voting Rights
Resolutions in the shareholders' meeting must be passed with a majority of at least 60%. The shareholder CLT-UFA has the sole right of nomination for the election of the Managing Director. This can only be overruled if shareholders who together represent at least 70% of the capital elect another candidate with at least 70% of the votes.
Individual Owner
Group / Individual Owner
Tele München Group
Tele München is a media company for the production and licence trading of films and series. Since the takeover by the US investment company KKR in 2019, Tele München has operated under the Leonine brand. In April 2024, another takeover of Leonine by the French media conglomerate Mediawan was announced. If the antitrust authorities approve the takeover, Leonine would become the German offshoot of a group of 85 production labels in 13 countries. The US investor KKR also holds shares in Mediawan.
General Information
Founding Year
1992
Affiliated Interests Founder
The company was founded as a joint venture by several partners. This was necessary in order to fulfil the requirements of the licensing authority (Hessische Landesanstalt für Privaten Rundfunk). The aim was to avoid giving one partner too much power. Even though Bertelsmann does not appear by name among the founders, it is the driving force. UFA is part of the group and the company already held a stake in CLT. Two years later, the two companies merged to form CLT-UFA, which later became RTL Group.
Affiliated Interests Ceo
made his career at the TV station ProSieben. He started there as an editor at the beginning of the 1990s and became Head of Programmes in 1999 after several positions. This was followed by various positions as Managing Director within the Group (kabel eins, Sat. 1, ProSieben) and a position on the Executive Board of ProSiebenSat.1 Media AG. Bartl left the Group in 2012 and joined rival broadcaster RTL Zwei as Managing Director in 2014. He is also Co-Managing Director of the company's own TV marketer El Cartel.
Affiliated Interests Editor-In-Chief
Editor-in-Chief of RTL Deutschland, where RTL Zwei News is also produced, began his career with an apprenticeship at Axel Springer and moved to RTL as a news editor in 1989. There he held various roles in the editorial department until he finally became editor-in-chief in 2014. From July 2024, Christian Schleker will initially become additional editor-in-chief until Wulf retires in the near future.
Affiliated Interests other important people
is Managing Director - CFO/COO at RTL Zwei. She shares the management with Andreas Bartl. Prior to her current position, she was Deputy CFO and COO of RTL Zwei and has been responsible for the channel's controlling since 2012. Prior to that, she worked at El Cartel Media, the channel's marketer, and started her career at SevenOne Media in Pricing & Inventory Management.
has been Managing Director of El Cartel, the marketer of RTL Zwei, since June 2019. Previously, Karrer had been Deputy Managing Director since January 2018 and Head of Media Sales & Services at El Cartel since 2013. He began his career in 1999 as Key Account Manager at Sport1 and later worked for Discovery Networks as Director Ad Sales.
has been Chief Strategy & Data Officer at RTL Zwei since May 2020 and heads the "Data & Innovation" division. Ehrler began his career in 2009 as a dual student at RTL Zwei and subsequently worked in Controlling and Business Development. He completed a master's degree in "Business Innovation and Management Consulting" and was a management consultant from 2017 before taking over as head of the "Insights & Data Analytics" department in 2018.
is Head of Channel Strategy & Content Distribution at RTL Zwei. He is also Head of Consumer Marketing as well as Music and Event Cooperations. Having joined the company in 2008, the media economics graduate initially worked in Controlling and from 2010 as Head of Programme Planning. In 2014, he took over the management of the Programme Planning division and, since 2018, also the company's digital strategy.
Contact
RTL2 Fernsehen GmbH & Co. KG
Lil-Dagover-Ring 1
82031 Grünwald
Telefon: +49(0) 89-64 185 0
E-Mail: website-management@rtl2.de
Website: www.rtl2.de
Financial Information
Revenue (in Mill. $)
€ 305 Million / USD 320 Million (2022)
Operating Profit (in Mill. $)
€ 43 Million / USD 45 Million (2022)
Advertising (in % of total funding)
84% : € 256 Million / USD 267 Million (2022)
Market Share
Missing Data
Further Information
Meta Data
RTL Zwei is primarily a channel for the German region, but the programme can also be received in Austria and Switzerland and is broadcast there with localised advertising blocks. We therefore classify the channel as international.
The average exchange rate from the corresponding financial year was used for the conversion from euros to US dollars (2022: USD 1.05).
