Ali Ibrahim takes over as Managing Director of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH on 1 October 2026

Ali Ibrahim, who joined HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH as a trainee in 2016, becomes its Managing Director on 1 October 2026. He succeeds Manuel Pinke, who is stepping down for private reasons after a tenure dominated by the show's relocation from Munich to Vienna. Our report looks at Ibrahim's career, the handover and the tasks that await him at the organiser of HIGH END, FINEST AUDIO SHOW, IPS and WORLD OF HEADPHONES.

Michael Holzinger 29 September 2026Last Updated: 30 September 2026

0 5 minutes read

Foto © High End Society Service GmbH - Axel Reitz | Ali Ibrahim will take over as Managing Director of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH on October 1, 2026.

From 1 October 2026, Ali Ibrahim, 31, will run HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH, the organiser of HIGH END, FINEST AUDIO SHOW, IPS – International Parts + Supply and WORLD OF HEADPHONES, succeeding Manuel Pinke, who is leaving the post for private reasons. A member of the company since his apprenticeship in 2016, he knows exhibitors, partners and event formats at first hand, and his brief is to build on the first HIGH END at the Austria Center Vienna, held from 4 to 7 June 2026.

The HIGH END SOCIETY has a new man at the top of its operating company, and he is one of its own. On 1 October 2026, Ali Ibrahim takes over as Managing Director of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH, the organiser of the HIGH END show. The change comes just months after the show left Munich, where it had been based for more than two decades, for its debut at the Austria Center Vienna in June 2026. Ali Ibrahim is 31 and has spent his entire working life with the company. His predecessor Manuel Pinke, who was in post from 1 November 2025 and helped steer the move to Vienna, is relinquishing the role for private reasons.

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Key Facts

Ali Ibrahim becomes Managing Director of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH on 1 October 2026.
He succeeds Manuel Pinke, who is leaving the position for private reasons.
Ali Ibrahim is 31 and has worked for the company since 2016.
His career began with an apprenticeship as an office management clerk, specialising in event management.
Most recently he was Marketing and Event Manager.
His previous responsibilities included trade fair organisation, marketing and advertising planning, and the delivery of events.
Manuel Pinke had taken over as Managing Director from Stefan Dreischärf on 1 November 2025.
His time in office included the first HIGH END at the Austria Center Vienna in June 2026.

A career that began with an apprenticeship

Ali Ibrahim’s link with HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH goes back to 2016, when he started an apprenticeship as an office management clerk with a focus on event management at the show’s organiser. He never left. Instead, he took on wider responsibilities step by step.

As Marketing and Event Manager, he was most recently in charge of marketing and advertising planning as well as organising and running the company’s events. For many years he also managed the marketing budget for HIGH END and the other shows the company stages. According to the company, he adds solid business knowledge and experience in journalism and media work.

Ali Ibrahim has also become a more visible face of the organisation. Beyond the organisational and financial machinery behind the scenes, he has, for example, hosted trade sessions as a moderator within the HIGH END programme.

In his own words, the move into management means more than a new job:

“For me, this is more than a new assignment. I am taking on responsibility not only for a company that has shaped me over many years, but also for the people I have worked with for a long time. On that foundation, I want to shape the coming years with a clear direction – for our exhibitors, our visitors and the entire industry.”

The ten years between the start of his apprenticeship in 2016 and his appointment as Managing Director have given him a close-up view of virtually every development at the organiser, and a hand in many of them.

What he inherits: a show that has just moved

Ali Ibrahim takes the reins when the biggest upheaval in the recent history of HIGH END is already done. After 21 years at the MOC in Munich, HIGH END 2026 was staged in Vienna for the first time, and from 4 to 7 June 2026 the Austria Center Vienna became the new gathering place for the international HiFi industry.

The debut drew 500 exhibitors from 41 countries, around 1.000 brands and a total of 23.109 visitors from 104 countries, which the organiser counts as a successful start. The move was one of the central projects of Manuel Pinke’s comparatively short period as Managing Director.

The starting point therefore differs markedly from his predecessor’s. Pinke’s tenure was shaped largely by preparing and carrying out the relocation. Ibrahim arrives once that step has been completed, so his job will be to develop what has been achieved and to position HIGH END, together with the company’s other event formats, for the long term.

Manuel Pinke steps down after less than a year

Manuel Pinke took over the management of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH on 1 November 2025 from Stefan Dreischärf. He had worked for the organiser since 2020 as Senior Event Manager and had known HIGH END for many years from different vantage points within the audio industry.

Now Manuel Pinke is withdrawing from his role as Managing Director for private reasons. According to the HIGH END SOCIETY, the decision was made after careful consideration, and the association expressly respects it.

Jürgen Timm, Chairman of the Board of HIGH END SOCIETY e.V., singled out Pinke’s contribution at a decisive stage for the company and the show:

“We fully respect Manuel Pinke’s decision and thank him for his outstanding work, his integrity and his great personal commitment. In a short time he has achieved a great deal and, above all with the successful relocation of HIGH END to Vienna, has sent a strong signal for the future of our show.”

His term lasted less than a year, yet it coincided with one of the most significant changes in HIGH END’s recent history. The Vienna premiere not only changed the venue but also laid the groundwork for further developing the show’s international positioning in a new location.

Promotion from within, for the second time running

For the succession, HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH has once again looked inwards. Ali Ibrahim is not an outside manager who must first learn the company’s structures and the peculiarities of the international audio trade. He knows the internal workings, and he knows exhibitors, partners and the company’s different event formats from years of hands-on work.

The pattern is consistent. Manuel Pinke, too, had spent several years in a responsible position in trade fair organisation before becoming Managing Director. With Ibrahim, the company continues down the same path.

That someone who began his career with an apprenticeship at the company takes over its management ten years later also marks a pronounced generational shift. At 31, Ibrahim assumes responsibility for an organiser whose flagship event has been one of the main meeting points of the international high-end audio industry for decades.

The company and its events

HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH was founded in 1995 to handle the operational and commercial activities of HIGH END SOCIETY e.V. As an independent subsidiary of the interest group for high-quality sound and picture reproduction, it carries out the association’s commercial projects.

The events it organises are HIGH END, the international trade show for high-quality audio technology; the FINEST AUDIO SHOW; IPS – International Parts + Supply, the trade fair for suppliers; and WORLD OF HEADPHONES. The company also handles marketing, PR and press work around these events.

The operational and commercial responsibility for all of these projects lies with HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH. With the handover from Manuel Pinke to Ali Ibrahim, it again rests with a manager who has known the company and its events from everyday practice for many years.

Getting to the point

The change at the top of HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH comes at a remarkable moment. After the successful premiere of HIGH END in Vienna, the organiser’s task is less about completing a relocation than about making long-term use of the new foundation. That this job now goes to a manager who has spent his entire career with the company ensures a high degree of continuity. At the same time, the appointment marks a clear generational change: going from trainee to Managing Director within a decade is anything but routine in this industry. Ali Ibrahim knows HIGH END, its exhibitors, partners and visitors not from management presentations but from day-to-day organisational work. After the big step from Munich to Vienna, the next chapter for the HIGH END SOCIETY Service GmbH begins now.