People

Helmut Perlet is to be the new chairman of Allianz. The former Chief Financial Officer will replace Henning Schulte-Noelle, who is reaching the age limit of 70, in 2012. Europe’s biggest insurer refers only, without comment, to the fact that at the Annual General Meeting on 9 May 2012 a regular election of the Supervisory Board is due. Its members will then elect the chair.

With effect from 1 January 2012 Peter Willbrandt was appointed Aurubis CEO as successor to Bernd Drouven. With the 49-year-old, the supervisory board of Germany’s largest copper smelter on 28 September unanimously decided to follow an internal solution, which the employees welcomed. Drouven is leaving the company at the end of the year; the board is thus reduced from five members to four.

Elke Strathmann was appointed as Continental’s new head of personnel at the last Board meeting on 28 September. She will assume her office in the first quarter of 2012. Until then, the post is occupied by Heinz-Gerhard Wente, who remains responsible in the new year for the highly profitable ContiTech rubber division and for purchasing. 53 years old, she previously worked as personnel manager at Nestlé Deutschland in Frankfurt am Main.

At Demag Cranes, following the acquisition by Terex, alongside Burkhard Schuchmann with Professor Karlheinz Hornung, Robert J. Koehler, Herbert Meyer, Rudolf Rupprecht and Jens Tischendorf, all the other shareholder representatives also resigned from the Supervisory Board with effect from 23 September. The District Court of Düsseldorf, with effect from 24 September, court-appointed the independent consultants Axel Joachim Arendt and Oren G. Shaffer, Kevin A. Barr (Senior Vice President Human Resources at Terex), Michael W. Ernestus (investment banker at G.C. Andersen Partners), Brian J. Henry (Senior Vice President Finance and Business Development at Terex), as well as the lawyer Michael Leue of the law firm Bryan Cave LLP, to the body until the next Annual General Meeting. Elliott is not sending a Supervisory Board member. The hedge fund owns ten percent of the Düsseldorf crane manufacturer.

In Kathrin Menges, Henkel has appointed its first woman to its governing body. The only DAX Group with a woman as Supervisory Board chair, since September 2009, is thus setting another landmark in the advancement of women in time for its 135-year anniversary. The 46-year-old will be responsible for human resources on the board of Germany’s biggest consumer goods producers as from 1 October.

HOCHTIEF, searching for a new CFO, has headhunted Peter Sassenfeld from Ferrostaal. When the MBA (45) will take office is still open. He will succeed Burkhard Lohr, who after losing the defensive struggle against ACS is to leave the construction company on 18 October. Lohr had exercised his early-termination rights.

Hans Volkert Volckens is moving to IVG Immobilien as Chief Financial Officer. There he will run the central areas of Finance, Accounting & Taxes, Controlling and Legal & Compliance. Besides Volckens, Christian Kühni has also, since 1 October, filled out the governing body, alongside Wolfgang Schäfer. He takes over the function of spokesman. The Supervisory Board has appointed Kühni a full board member with the function of COO; he will be responsible for the operational units of the firm, which is going down the MDAX. Board spokesman Gerd Niesslein had earlier told the AGM of Germany’s largest publicly-traded commercial real-estate firm he did not want to extend his contract, expiring in October.

Frank Einhellinger is letting his contract at JENOPTIK, running until June 2012, expire. He wanted to “tackle new challenges”, but would “continue to provide advice” to the technology company, it was said. The Supervisory Board “regretted” Einhellinger’s decision. Michael Mertin (45) would, however, remain another five years at the helm, said the Thuringian TecDAX Group.

The Supervisory Board of Klöckner & Co has appointed Bill Partalis to the board. The American will in October become third board member, for the “Americas” segment, alongside CEO Gisbert Rühl and business-operations director Ulrich Becker. With the establishment of the new sector, the supervisory board is taking account of the increased importance of U.S. business through the acquisitions of Macsteel and Frefer.

ProSiebenSat.1 Media has expanded the board by two, to five members. On 1 October the TV station group newly appointed Conrad Albert and Christian Wegner to the Board, so far including Thomas Ebeling (CEO) and Axel Salzmann (CFO). Albert is to head the newly created department of Legal Affairs, Distribution and Governmental & Regulatory Affairs; Wagner will assume responsibility for New Media & Diversification, vacant after the departure of Dan Marks, who left the company last year after only a few months. On 4 October, Andreas Bartl passed the baton to Joachim Kosack, as the MDAX-listed company announced on 27 September. Kosack is now head of drama, and since April also Co-Director of the Unterföhring-based broadcaster. After the surprise departure of Guido Bolten in early 2010 Bartl had taken over the management on an interim basis.