The Digital Red Ribbon | Michael Trautmann | TEDxHongKong

1,584 views · Published 20 January 2015 · 15:37 · Indexed 25 September 2026

Channel: TEDx Talks · 2015 · Nonprofits & Activism

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This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences. A powerful HIV awareness campaign for Michael Trautmann started with a simple idea - by adding a dot to create a top-level .HIV domain.

Michael Trautmann
Founder, CEO thjnk, Co-Founder dotHIV Initiative

After graduating from the University of Augsburg with a PhD in 1993, Michael Trautmann became a manager at Bossard Consultants. 1997 saw him assume a position on the Executive Board at ad agency Springer & Jacoby where, in 2000, he became a founding partner of Springer & Jacoby International and a member of the holding company’s Board. From 2002 to 2004, Michael Trautmann joined Audi in Ingolstadt as Global Head of Marketing. Then, in July 2004, he established the agency kempertrautmann gmbh as a co-founder, which underwent a rebranding in August 2012 to become thjnk ag. thjnk ag employs 250 people across its three offices in Berlin, Düsseldorf and Hamburg – and clients include brands like Audi, Commerzbank, Haribo, IKEA and Paulaner. Michael Trautmann was named Agency Man of the Year 2007 by the HORIZONT industry journal and kempertrautmann was voted ‘Global Newcomer Agency of the Year’ in 2009. Michael Trautmann is co-founder, team member and business angel for the not-for-profit initiative dotHIV. Together with partners from various backgrounds and his agency thjnk, dotHIV has successfully registered the ‘.hiv’ top level domain. This is the world’s first top-level domain with an exclusively social mission: to bring the red ribbon into the digital age and enable every company and every user on the web to participate in the fight against AIDS. In 2013, Michael Trautmann was elected Vice President of GWA, the Gesamtverband der deutschen Werbeagenturen (Association of German Advertising Agencies).

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