Hans-Joachim Körber has been appointed as the new chairman of German airline Air Berlin.

Mr Körber, a current board member, will replace the incumbent Johannes Zurnieden on January 1st 2011 following his decision to step down. An entrepreneur from Bonn, Zurnieden – who is perhaps best known as owner of Phoenix Reisen - was a partner in Air Berlin Luftverkehrs KG for many years.

After the flotation of Air Berlin in May 2006, he became chairman of the board of directors of the company that had been transformed into an English plc at the end of 2005.

Following the decision Air Berlin chief executive, Joachim Hunold, commented: “Johannes Zurnieden has accompanied and advanced the development of our company from a small charter airline to the second largest German carrier.

“With his unflagging commitment and the fairness which has marked his entire period in office, he has made a major contribution to Air Berlin.”

Zurnieden will remain a shareholder and board member, but will be devoting more time to other duties in future.

Chairman Körber

His successor, Hans-Joachim Körber has been a member of Air Berlin’s board since May 2006.

Holding a university degree in business administration, Körber was chairman of the board of management at Metro AG from 1999 until 2007 and now serves on the supervisory boards of several international companies.

World Mobi

Also in Berlin today, World Mobi launched its new city guide.

World Mobi offers the most comprehensive mobile travel guides available, with over 800 cities in 200 countries listed. Each is developed by the World Mobi team to combine into a single global travel directory.

However, each city retains its own mobile identity via a dedicated domain. Already on offer are Brussels.mobi, London.Mobi, Sanfrancisco.Mobi and Sydney.Mobi.

Berlin.Mobi is the latest in this illustrious line up, offering click to call functionality – which means no scribbling down telephone numbers.

Most entries are also linked to websites where users can quickly access more detailed information if needed.

Other key features include information on accommodation, restaurants, attractions, entertainment, nightlife, shopping, transport, and weather.

City.Mobi guides include user reviews and traveller utilities such as a translation guide, currency converter, news and local weather guide.