Strong 2018 – continuity in company leadership
Hamburg, Germany. The shareholders of Jungheinrich AG passed a resolution at today’s Annual General Meeting in Hamburg to pay a dividend for the 2018 financial year of €0.50 per preferred share. In his speech, Hans-Georg Frey, Chairman of the Board of Management, presented the company’s positive performance in 2018 as well as in January and February 2019. Speaking to 600 shareholders and guests at his last Annual General Meeting as Chairman of the Board of Management of Jungheinrich AG, he looked back on his twelve years in office. As announced in summer 2018, Supervisory Board Chairman Jürgen Peddinghaus confirmed to shareholders that he would be leaving the Supervisory Board. He will resign his seat at the end of August this year. The Annual General Meeting then elected Hans-Georg Frey as a member of the Supervisory Board as of 1 September 2019.
On behalf of the two shareholding families, Wolf and Lange, Wolff Lange said, “On behalf of the Wolf and Lange families, I would like to thank Jürgen Peddinghaus for his exceptional commitment and great loyalty to Jungheinrich. Jürgen Peddinghaus has been a member of the Jungheinrich Supervisory Board since 2001 and its chairman since 2006. During this time, he left a particularly profound mark on the company and steered the work within the Supervisory Board, with the Board of Management and with the shareholding families with great success. Thanks to his commercial experience and diplomatic skills, Jungheinrich has performed very successfully under his supervision and has also made it through difficult periods, such as the crisis year 2009 or personnel changes within the Board of Management. We regret his decision to resign his Supervisory Board seat.
Under these circumstances, it is the wish of both shareholding families that Hans-Georg Frey should move to the Supervisory Board of Jungheinrich and succeed Jürgen Peddinghaus as chairman when he ceases to be Chairman of the Board of Management in September. This secures the continuity of company leadership for the good of the Group and all its 18,000 employees. Hans-Georg Frey has led the company very successfully since he joined Jungheinrich in 2007 and has gained the personal trust of both shareholding families. We are therefore delighted that he will be staying with the company in his new role.
In Dr Lars Brzoska the company is gaining a new Management Board Chairman who has been with Jungheinrich for five years in various Management Board positions, first as Marketing & Sales Director and now as Member of the Board of Management Engineering, and who has made a key contribution to our success in recent years. He therefore has unique expertise and outstanding qualifications for this role. By appointing an internal successor, who has worked very closely with Hans-Georg Frey for many years, we are also ensuring leadership continuity within the Board of Management.”