Sigrid van Aken (born March 1, 1970,
Amsterdam) is the chief executive officer of
Postcode Lottery Group, recognized as the world's 3rd largest private
charity donor, after the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation & the
Wellcome Trust.
Early life and career
Sigrid van Aken studied French Language and Literature at the
University of Utrecht. She joined
Rabobank Paris in 1994. In 1998, she became senior IT consultant for
KPMG Consulting
KPMG International Limited (or simply KPMG) is a multinational professional services network, and one of the Big Four accounting organizations.
Headquartered in Amstelveen, Netherlands, although incorporated in London, England, KPMG is a netw ...
.
In 2002, Sigrid van Aken joined VriendenLoterij and
Nationale Postcode Loterij
The Nationale Postcode Loterij (National Postcode Lottery) is the biggest charity lottery in the Netherlands. It was founded in 1989 by Novamedia, a marketing agency that sets up and runs charity lotteries. Forty percent of the proceeds of this lo ...
, lotteries of Novamedia / Postcode Lottery Group.
In 2009, she completed a leadership program at the
International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in
Lausanne, Switzerland.
After holding multiple senior and international leadership roles over her two-decade career at Postcode Lottery Group, and since 2013 as executive board member/COO, she assumed the role of CEO, succeeding
Boudewijn Poelmann
Boudewijn Poelmann (born 3 February 1949, Bussum) is a Dutch entrepreneur and co-founder of the Netherlands's Nationale Postcode Lottery. In 1983, he helped to start the media company, Novamedia.
Before establishing Novamedia in 1983, he worked ...
, in 2020.
Beyond her corporate responsibilities, Sigrid van Aken served on the Supervisory Board of Amsterdam's public transport company
GVB from 2013 to 2021.
As a CEO
Sigrid van Aken is responsible for all entities and operations of the Postcode Lotteries in five countries:
Netherlands (1989), Sweden (2005), Great Britain (2005), Germany (2016), Norway (2018) – the latter are collectively known as the Postcode Lottery Group. In 2024, the group announced the establishment of the Canadian Postcode Lottery Foundation in
Canada.
The year following her appointment as CEO, Sigrid van Aken was invited to speak at the prestigious Prinsjesdagontbijt, held on Prinsjesdag, marking the annual opening of the Dutch parliamentary year.
Since its inception, the Postcode Lottery Group has raised more than 13.5 billion euros in support of thousands of charitable initiatives, locally and internationally. According to the
Associated Press, in 2023, the group stood among the largest private donors to
Ukraine, contributing 155.2 million euros (165.9 million USD) to humanitarian and
human rights organizations operating in Ukraine or assisting
refugee
A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution. s. The Dutch branch donated 100.6 million euros (113.3 million dollars).
Awards and honors
Sigrid van Aken has been repeatedly ranked in the Dutch publication Opzij top 100 as the most influential woman in the Charities category.
In 2020, she made it to the 59th position of
Volkskrant Top 200, the list of most influential Dutch people.
Personnal life
Sigrid van Aken lives in
Amsterdam with her family.
References
External links
Postcode Lottery Group
{{DEFAULTSORT:Van Aken, Sigrid
1970 births
Living people
Dutch chief executives
Women chief executives