Lars-Hendrik Röller

Lars-Hendrik Röller (born in Frankfurt am Main on July 19, 1958) is a German economist who served as the Director General for Economic and Financial Policy at the German Chancellery from 2011 to 2022, a position that made him Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief economic advisor.

He previously was the president of the European School of Management and Technology (ESMT) in Berlin.

He earned a B.Sc. in computer science from the Texas A&M University in 1981 as well as a M.Sc. in artificial intelligence and a M.A. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania in 1982 and 1983.

In 1987, Röller obtained a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania, where he also briefly worked as lecturer, with a thesis on the theory and application of contestable markets.

Röller worked as assistant professor (1987–91) and later associate professor (1991–95) and full professor of economics (1995–99) at INSEAD in Fontainebleau.

From 1994, he worked in Berlin in various functions, directing the Institute on Competitiveness and Industrial Change at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center from 1994 to 2007, where he also has been working as research professor on innovation and competition since 2007, and holding the chair of the Institute of Industrial Economics at Humboldt University Berlin since 1995.

In 2002, he was awarded the Gossen Prize in recognition for his contributions to empirical industrial economics.

A native of Frankfurt am Main, Röller is the son of the former chairman of the board of Dresdner Bank, Wolfgang Röller.

His contributions to research have been acknowledged through the Gossen Prize (2002), a fellowship of the European Economic Association (2004), and a membership of the German Academy of Sciences (2008).

Key contributions of his research include the following:

In addition to his academic positions, Röller served as chief competition economist at the European Commission under successive presidents Romano Prodi and José Manuel Barroso from 2003 until 2006, in this capacity advising European Commissioners for Competition Mario Monti and Neelie Kroes.

Additionally, Röller was a full professor at the European School of Management and Technology, which he presided over between 2006 and 2011.

Throughout his academic career, Röller has held visiting appointments at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, New York University, Stanford University, and the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration (NHH).

In 2011, Röller succeeded Jens Weidmann as Director General for Economic and Financial Policy at the German Chancellery, a position that makes him Chancellor Angela Merkel's chief economic advisor.

In this role, he – among else – leads Germany's negotiation team at the G7 and G20 meetings of Merkel's chancellorship.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he co-chaired (alongside Zane Dangor) the Access to COVID-19 Tools Accelerator's Vaccine Manufacturing Working Group from June 2021.

Röller maintains affiliations with the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy (Georgetown University), the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), where he has led the programme on industrial organization, and the European think tank Bruegel.

In terms of professional service, Röller was president of the German Economic Association and the European Association for Research in Industrial Economics, member of the board of Bruegel and of the advisory board of the DIW and the Forschungsinstitut für Wirtschaftsverfassung und Wettbewerb, of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation's Scientific Council for Transatlantic Cooperation, and of the German-French Council of Economic Advisers, among else.

He also is a member of the American Economic Association, European Economic Association, German Economic Association, and American Bar Association.

Röller is or has been performing editorial duties for the Global Competition Litigation Review, Journal of German and European Competition Law, Journal of Productivity Analysis, International Journal of Industrial Organization, Journal of Industrial Economics, and Managerial and Decision Economics.

Röller's research focuses on the economics of competition, technology, and innovation.