Renate Nikolay is now Deputy Director General at DG CNECT. From November 2014 to November 2022, she served as Head of Cabinet of Vĕra Jourová, the now Vice President for Values and Transparency and former Commissioner for Justice and Consumers. Renate Nikolay has worked on matters such as rule of law, media freedom and disinformation. She also played a key role in the adoption of the data protection reform, the negotiations on an EU-US data transfer arrangement, the establishment of the European Public Prosecutor and the Code of Conduct with platforms on online hate speech. Between 2011 and 2014, she led the Unit of interinstitutional and international relations at DG JUST, dealing with legislative files and international negotiations such as those with the US on data protection in law enforcement. Prior to that, she was advisor in the Cabinet of the first High Representative / Vice President Cathy Ashton, where she handled relations with the European Parliament in setting up the European External Action Service and relations with Asia, in particular China. From 2004 to2009 she was a member of the Cabinet of the Trade Commissioners Peter Mandelson and Baroness Cathy Ashton, where she was part of the negotiating team in the trade talks in the multilateral trade round of the World Trade Organisation (the Doha Round) and the EU-South Korea Free Trade Agreement, which was finalised in 2009. She started her career at the European Commission in the Directorate General for Trade in November 2003, dealing with the accession negotiations of Vietnam to the World Trade Organisation and the Trade Policy Committee with the Member States. Prior to that, she was a diplomat in the German Permanent Representation in Brussels and worked as private Secretary to the German G7 Sherpa at the German Ministry of Economics. She holds a law degree (Erstes und Zweites Staatsexamen) from the Free University in Berlin and a Master’s as a Fulbright Scholar in Washington DC. She was also an Erasmus Scholar in Grenoble, France.