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[reuters] Rene Obermann can finally bask in rare praise, after more than five years trying to get investors on his side.

Obermann’s decision to draw a line under Deutsche Telekom’s global ambitions by selling T-Mobile USA — a quarter of the company — to U.S. operator AT&T for $39 billion appears to have redefined external perceptions of him overnight.

As chief executive his image has been of a low-key and somewhat uninspiring leader, eager to keep unions and politicians happy and wary of taking big strategic decisions.

The AT&T deal has forced people to revise that view of Obermann, a German born in March 1963, not least because few had expected such a decisive break with the past.

“You could say he has put his mark on the company,” Silvia Quandt analyst Jacques Abramovicz said.

Ending Telekom’s U.S. odyssey earns Obermann praise