About

Erik Staebe is a highly regarded, ‘extremely intelligent lawyer’ who is ‘focused and business-oriented’. Since 2007, Staebe has led the regulatory department at Deutsche Bahn and is also in charge of all legal issues pertaining to rail, energy and telecoms regulatory matters, including antitrust and European law – an enormous task in a company with 300,000 employees and €39bn turnover. However, Staebe can boast significant experience and has been the one who built the regulatory management capability at the company from scratch, starting in 2005. He has adjusted the work of the department in two major areas: The department not only provides advice when asked, but has become a pro-active entity, and Staebe has grown the reach across European borders. ‘We were able to utilise the groundwork we had already done regarding German regulatory law and test it regarding its potential commercial opportunities for subsidiaries in other jurisdictions’. Highlights have been several proceedings won, among them the antitrust proceedings of the European Commission against DB Energie regarding allegedly inflated rail electricity prices. A major challenge has been the adjusting and implementing of the so-called ‘Konzernjuristenurteil’ of the Federal Administrative Court in 2010 which stipulates that DB AG’s legal department is not allowed to provide subsidiary DB Netz with comprehensive regulatory legal advice. Staebe has had the task of readjusting and restructuring the company’s regulatory management and to redefine the role of the regulatory law department. When working with law firms, external lawyers should be able ‘to realise the nature of the situation they are hired in: Does the client need legal advice, is it a matter of a second opinion, is an external lawyer required by law because of the nature of the matter or is it a problem of resources?’