Prof. Dr. Otte heads the Rail Regulation Department at the Bundesnetzagentur, Germany's regulatory authority for electricity, gas, telecommunications, post and rail. He began working at the Bundesnetzagentur in October 2006. From 2016 until April 2019 he also served as chairman of the ruling chamber for railway regulation at the Bundesnetzagentur. Together with colleagues from the University of Regensburg (and, earlier, from the University of Tübingen) he has chaired the annual legal symposium for contemporary rail regulatory issues since 2006.
Before joining the Bundesnetzagentur Prof. Otte taught at German universities in Cologne, Leipzig, Heidelberg, Munich, Frankfurt am Main and Mannheim in the fields of conflicts and business law, civil law and (international) civil procedure. From 2001 to 2006 he was a professor at the University of Mannheim at the Endowed Chair of European Transport and Traffic Law, Civil Law, Private International and Procedural Law and directed the university's Institute for Inland Navigation.
Parallel to his professional commitment at the Bundesnetzagentur, Prof. Otte has continued working as an associate professor at the University of Mannheim's Institute of Transport and Traffic Law. In August 2006 he received an honorary professorship at the Odessa National Marine University in Ukraine. He has authored numerous publications on civil law, procedural law and rail regulation law. Since 2017 he has been authoring and co-publishing (together with the chairman of Germany's Monopolies Commission) a well-known reference and commentary book on rail regulation law.
For many years Prof. Otte's focus has been on various international issues and the law of transport and logistics. After completing his law studies in Cologne, Geneva and London he also obtained a Master of Comparative Jurisprudence at the University of Texas (Austin) in 1985. He holds a doctorate degree in law and earned a post-doctoral "Habilitation" degree in 1996.