The Burda family

The family members who have a stake in Hubert Burda Media are the publisher Dr Hubert Burda and his two children Dr Jacob Hubert Linus Burda and Elisabeth Furtwängler. In 1903, Franz Burda I laid the foundation stone for the family business in Philippsburg, which is now almost 120 years old. Today it is called Hubert Burda Media. His son, Senator Franz Burda, transformed the originally small three-man printing shop into one of the largest printing and publishing houses in the Federal Republic of Germany. In 1987, Hubert Burda, the current senior member of the Burda family, took over the management of the group.

In 1967, Hubert Burda married the art historian Christa Maar (deceased 2022). The marriage was divorced in 1972. Their son Felix Burda, who was born on 25 November 1967 and also obtained a doctorate in art history, died of bowel cancer at the age of 33 at the end of 2001. Christa Maar and Hubert Burda campaigned for better prevention in this area and founded the Felix Burda Foundation, of which Hubert Burda is still chairman of the board of trustees and foundation board. The purpose of the foundation is to promote public health and teaching, science and research in the field of the development, prevention, detection and treatment of cancer, in particular bowel cancer. The Felix Burda Foundation is an independent foundation without legal capacity, which is administered by the Hubert Burda Foundation in a fiduciary capacity. Since 8 November 1991, Burda has been married in his second marriage to the doctor and actress Maria Furtwängler-Burda, known from the ARD crime series ‘Tatort’, among other things, and has two children with her: Dr Jacob Hubert Linus Burda and Elisabeth Furtwängler.

Hubert Burda is the chairman of the Digital Life Design (DLD) conference, which takes place every January in Munich. It is the international conference and innovation platform of Hubert Burda Media. Hubert Burda is also the Chairman of the Hubert Burda Foundation. Since 2000, the foundation has been promoting literary works by contemporary authors, the work of translators, scientific publications, exhibitions by visual artists and the work of museum curators. The foundation supports projects that correspond to a national and European perspective: what will endure in the future. Dr Jacob Hubert Linus Burda and Elisabeth Furtwängler are also members of the boards of trustees of the Felix Burda Foundation and the Hubert Burda Foundation, whose chairman is their father Hubert Burda.

Dr Hubert Burda holds 25 per cent of the shares in the billion-euro media group Hubert Burda Media, while his two children Elisabeth Furtwängler and Dr Jacob Hubert Linus Burda each hold 37.5 per cent.

Dr Hubert Burda, born Hubert Dietrich Burda in 1940, son of the publishing couple ‘Senator’ Franz Burda (1903-1986) and Aenne Burda (1909-2005), studied art history, archaeology and sociology at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich. He received his doctorate in 1966 with a thesis on ‘The Ruins in the Pictures of Hubert Roberts’. Burda has made a name for himself worldwide as an entrepreneur, publisher, digital pioneer, art historian and editor-in-chief. The managing partner of Hubert Burda Media Holding today stands for the success story of his media group. He was married to art historian Christa Maar (1939-2022) from 1967 to 1972; their son Felix Burda, who was born in 1967 and also completed a doctorate in art history, died of bowel cancer in 2001 at the age of 33. Since 1991, Burda has been married to the doctor and actress Maria Furtwängler-Burda; their children Jacob Burda and Elisabeth Furtwängler have each held 37.5 per cent of the group holding company since 2017. When Hubert Burda took over his father's publishing house in Offenburg in January 1987, the company still reported a turnover of 500 million German marks. In 2010, he handed over operational management of the company to Paul-Bernhard Kallen – the current Chairman of the Board of Directors –; he was followed by Martin Weiss as the new CEO in 2022. Hubert Burda turned 80 on 9 February 2020. Hubert Burda was editor of Bunte for twelve years, from 1974 to 1986. Initially as a holiday replacement for his father and Bunte founder Franz Burda, he then took over as editor-in-chief in 1976. The young editor already had a certain idea of how an editorial office works, having gained experience in various editorial staffs of American magazines during a stay in the USA. As a publisher, Hubert Burda knows how to move in different, only seemingly opposing worlds: in the world of journalism, the world of publishing and printing – as well as in the consideration of fine arts and literature. In 1993, he made German publishing history with the launch of the news magazine FOCUS, which achieved unprecedented commercial success. The introduction of a new news design with graphics and charts made it possible to convey complex content more quickly.

Dr Hubert Burda is a member of the Administrative Board of Hubert Burda Media. Hubert Burda's wealth is estimated at around USD 3.7 billion (according to the Forbes 2024 list), which puts him in 874th place on the Forbes list of the world's richest people (as of 2024). This makes him the richest publisher in the Federal Republic of Germany (as of 2024), ahead of Friede Springer and Stefan von Holtzbrinck.

Dr Jacob Hubert Linus Burda (37.43%) is part of the Burda family. He is the son of Dr Hubert Burda and Maria Furtwängler. He is a member of the Administrative Board of Hubert Burda Media. He received his doctorate from the University of Oxford with a dissertation on the concept of infinity in early German Romanticism. His dissertation was translated into German and published by Metzler. He has lectured on German literature and philosophy at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is particularly interested in cultural history, phenomenology (especially Heidegger) and the philosophy of physics. Burda is well connected in the digital scene in Silicon Valley and apparently invested in Spotify at an early stage. However, he does not yet have any experience in the traditional publishing business. Burda is co-founder of the ‘Alpine Fellowship’, an annual symposium on aesthetics and ideas that supports, commissions and presents artists, writers, academics and playwrights.

Elisabeth ‘Lisa’ Furtwängler (37.43%) is also a member of the Administrative Board of Hubert Burda Media. She is the daughter of Maria Furtwängler and Hubert Burda. On her father's side, she is the granddaughter of Aenne and Franz Burda, and on her mother's side, the great-niece of the conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler. After graduating from high school, she travelled through Cambodia, with a stopover in the Philippines. She gained her first editorial experience at the Burda magazine Bunte. She initially studied art history in Cambridge and later songwriting and production in Los Angeles. Elisabeth Furtwängler is also known for her social commitment. Together with her mother Maria Furtwängler, she founded the MaLisa Foundation in 2016, which aims to create a free society with equal rights. As a musician, Elisabeth is known under the stage name Kerfor. Her music can be categorised as pop and rap. Her first single, ‘Never Ready, Go!’, was released in 2021.