Business News
Koenig & Bauer AGM elects Dr Gisela Lanza and Carl Ferdinand Oetker to supervisory board
Wednesday 27. May 2015 - Baldwin Knauf and Reinhart Siewert leave supervisory board
At the Koenig & Bauer (KBA) AGM on 21 May Baldwin Knauf (75) and Reinhart Siewert (77) resigned their seats on the supervisory board at their own request, one year before the five-year term of office expires. Prior to this the AGM discharged the duties of both shareholder representatives for the previous business year. The former longstanding KBA CFO and CEO Reinhart Siewert has been deputy chairman for the past twelve years. Successful entrepreneur Baldwin Knauf, a managing partner for many years and currently deputy chairman of the shareholders’ committee at Knauf Gips KG in Iphofen, has been a member of the KBA supervisory board since June 2006. Supervisory board chairman Dr Martin Hoyos thanked these longstanding board members for their unflagging commitment to the success of the company.
In accordance with a proposal made by the supervisory board, the AGM appointed Dr Gisela Lanza (41), university professor at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) as well as head of the Institute of Production Science (wbk) at KIT, and Carl Ferdinand Oetker (42), managing partner of FO Holding and managing director of WINK Verwaltungsgesellschaft (general partner of WINK Stanzwerkzeuge) as new members.
Reinhart Siewert is a KBA veteran following nearly 50 years of service at Koenig & Bauer. After joining the company on 1 July 1965 as assistant to the sales director, in 1975 he took over as assistant vice-president for security press sales and in 1976 he became the head of the financial accounting department. In 1978 he was appointed financial director and in 1979 executive vice-president for finances, shareholdings and organisation. Along with his role as CFO, he was president of KBA from 1995 until his move to the supervisory board in June 2003. Furthermore, he represented the interests of the parent at numerous subsidiaries and belonged to various boards at renowned companies. The financial expert, valued by the financial world, customers and the workforce, made a substantial contribution to the growth of this traditional company in becoming one of the world’s leading press manufacturers. Reinhart Siewert is still a very active sportsman despite his advanced age. On relinquishing his supervisory board seat he said: “At 77 it’s time to make room for the young.”
Baldwin Knauf brought 40 years of experience as managing partner of the internationally successful family-run company Knauf Group to the KBA supervisory board. Together with his cousin Nikolaus Knauf, both sons of the founding fathers, he built up the Knauf Group until his move to the shareholders’ committee in 2008. Today Knauf Gips KG is managed by his son Alexander Knauf and Manfred Grundke as managing partner. Further family members are active in the Group, many of them in management roles. The company which is still owned by the founding family operates at over 150 sites in more than 60 countries and in 2014 some 24,000 employees generated sales of more than 6bn.
Professor Gisela Lanza gained a degree in industrial engineering at the University of Karlsruhe and at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, USA. As a renowned production expert, she has strong ties in German industry and internationally. Amongst other roles, she is a member of the Bosch Rexroth supervisory board and founding director of the Global Advanced Manufacturing Institute (GAMI) in Suzhou, China.
Carl Ferdinand Oetker studied economics and international relations at Brown University in Providence, RI, USA. He then became a consultant at Boston Consulting Group as well as holding vice-president positions at various investment firms and at the ING BHF-Bank. In 2004 he began working at Bankhaus Lampe taking up a position as general manager until recently. Along with his role as managing director, he holds seats on supervisory and advisory boards at a raft of industrial and financial companies.