A Chat with Dr. Mirka Wilderer: One of the leading female executives in the water industry; President & Chief Executive Officer, Aqueous Vets; past Chief Executive Officer of De Nora Water Technologies; member of the distinguished GEN CEO Women's Network in Germany, the International Women's Forum (IWF), the Forbes Women's Forum; member of the Board of the "Doing Business Globally Network" as well as the "Impact Advisory Board" in the Young Presidents' Organization (YPO)

This week, Stephen Ibaraki has an exclusive interview with Dr. Mirka Wilderer.

Dr. Mirka Wilderer is recognized as one of the leading female executives in the water industry with deep experience in corporate strategies, business transformation, and cross-functional leadership in global organizations. In 2023, Mirka was appointed President & Chief Executive Officer of Aqueous Vets (AV), a portfolio company of Bain Capital Double Impact and industry leader in solving today's water quality challenges and tomorrow's Contaminants of Emerging Concerns (CEC) - such as PFAS.

Prior to AV, Mirka was the first female Chief Executive Officer of De Nora Water Technologies, a leader in disinfection and filtration technologies with a global footprint in the water industry. During her tenure the company successfully went public on the Euronext in June 2022. From 2014 and 2018, Mirka was Vice President and General Manager at Evoqua Water Technologies, where she held various leadership roles. During her time at Evoqua, the company accomplished a successful IPO on the NYSE in November 2017. Mirka started her career at Siemens AG as strategy consultant and held management positions in Germany, China, Thailand, Indonesia, the United States and South Africa.

She is known as a "get-things-done" executive that inspires leaders to translate bold strategies into agile action plans that accelerate the execution of transformative strategic initiatives to rapidly scale enterprise value. Her personal mission is to lead business transformation by tapping into all available talent to generate sustainable benefits for the greater good of society. She is striving to scale access to opportunity by leveraging diversity of thought and unity in purpose to create disruptive solutions in the water space.

Mirka's accomplishments include the esteemed recognition from Global Water Intelligence (GWI) as "One of the 20 Most Powerful Women in the Water Industry" (2020 & 2022), from the World Biz Magazine as "One of the Top 100 Innovation CEOs" (2021), from the Philadelphia Business Journal as"One of the Most Admired CEOs" (2021), from Titan 100 as "One of Colorado's Top CEOs” (2021, 2022), from Diversity MBA as "Top 100 under 50 Executive and Emerging Leaders" (2020), and from the Grand Rapids Business Journal as one of the "50 Most Influential Women in West Michigan" (2018) and one of the "Forty under 40" in West Michigan (2016). Mirka is a member of the distinguished GEN CEO Women's Network in Germany, the International Women's Forum (IWF), the Forbes Women's Forum, and is a member of the Board of the "Doing Business Globally Network" as well as the "Impact Advisory Council" in the Young Presidents' Organization (YPO).

Mirka is a frequent public speaker and has been on several CEO panels, such as a guest in a webinar hosted by SalesForce and Business Insider to discuss her efforts in driving digital transformation in the water space and pivoting during the COVID pandemic, accomplishments also featured in an article in Forbes.

Mirka holds a p.hd. (Dr. rer. pol.) in International Business and Social Sciences from the Carl von Ossietzky University in Germany. She graduated with her Master in Social Science and Business Studies at the Otto-Friedrich University in Germany and completed her master thesis at the Charles University of Prague, Czech Republic. In addition, she is an alumni from the Bayerische Elite Akademie. When not traveling, Mirka now calls Colorado, USA her home where she resides with her two children and her husband Andreas Wilderer (best-selling author of "Lean On - The Five Pillars of Support for Women in Leadership").