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18.04.2024

Lenzing AG: Elections to the Supervisory Board

On Thursday, April 18, 2024, the 80th Annual General Meeting of Lenzing AG discharged the members of the Managing Board and the Supervisory Board for the 2023 financial year and set the remuneration of the members of the Supervisory Board for the 2024 financial year in advance.

Dr. Markus Fürst retired from the Supervisory Board at his own request with effect from the end of the General Meeting. Dr. Markus Fürst has been a member of the Supervisory Board and various committees of Lenzing AG since 2021.

The General Meeting elected Dr. Cornelius Baur as a new member of the Supervisory Board of Lenzing AG until the end of the General Meeting that decides on the discharge for the 2028 financial year. In addition, Melody Harris-Jensbach’s mandate was extended until the Annual General Meeting that decides on the 2028 financial year.

On Thursday, April 18, 2024, the 80th Annual General Meeting of Lenzing AG discharged the members of the Managing Board and the Supervisory Board for the 2023 financial year and set the remuneration of the members of the Supervisory Board for the 2024 financial year in advance.

Dr. Markus Fürst retired from the Supervisory Board at his own request with effect from the end of the General Meeting. Dr. Markus Fürst has been a member of the Supervisory Board and various committees of Lenzing AG since 2021.

The General Meeting elected Dr. Cornelius Baur as a new member of the Supervisory Board of Lenzing AG until the end of the General Meeting that decides on the discharge for the 2028 financial year. In addition, Melody Harris-Jensbach’s mandate was extended until the Annual General Meeting that decides on the 2028 financial year.

The Supervisory Board of Lenzing AG continues to consist of ten members elected by the Annual General Meeting: Dr. Cornelius Baur, Mag. Helmut Bernkopf, Dr. Christian Bruch, Dr. Stefan Fida, Dr. Franz Gasselsberger, Melody Harris-Jensbach, Cord Prinzhorn, MBA, Mag. Gerhard Schwartz, Dr. Astrid Skala-Kuhmann and Nicole van der Elst Desai. DI Stefan Ertl, Stephan Gruber, Bonita Haag, Helmut Kirchmair and Johann Schernberger were delegated to the Supervisory Board by the works council.

In the constitutive meeting of the Supervisory Board following the Annual General Meeting, Cord Prinzhorn, MBA, was elected Chairman and Dr. Stefan Fida was re-elected as Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board.

KPMG Austria GmbH Wirtschaftsprüfungs- u. Steuerberatungsgesellschaft was appointed as the auditor for the annual financial statements and the consolidated financial statements for the 2024 financial year.

Bohrgerät Schiefergas Bohrhaken Photo: Pixabay
26.04.2022

Natural gas embargo against Russian Federation would mean the end for man-made fibre producers

With its current position paper, the Industrievereinigung Chemiefaser e.V. takes a stand on the intense discussions about an embargo against Russian natural gas supplies. The association believes that Germany's economic and global political future can only be secured with a strong industrial base and therefore, weighing up all positions and influencing factors and assessing the consequences for labour and the market economy, cannot support a short-term natural gas embargo on Russia.

An interruption of the continuous supply of natural gas would result in immense losses for the chemical fibre companies, which could even lead to the destruction of the industry in Germany. The losses are made up of technical damage caused by an uncoordinated shutdown of plants on the one hand and market-related consequential damage caused by lost production and a lack of product sales on the other.

With its current position paper, the Industrievereinigung Chemiefaser e.V. takes a stand on the intense discussions about an embargo against Russian natural gas supplies. The association believes that Germany's economic and global political future can only be secured with a strong industrial base and therefore, weighing up all positions and influencing factors and assessing the consequences for labour and the market economy, cannot support a short-term natural gas embargo on Russia.

An interruption of the continuous supply of natural gas would result in immense losses for the chemical fibre companies, which could even lead to the destruction of the industry in Germany. The losses are made up of technical damage caused by an uncoordinated shutdown of plants on the one hand and market-related consequential damage caused by lost production and a lack of product sales on the other.

Depending on the location and size of the plants, a short-term outage due to a lack of natural gas would result in average losses of EUR 5 million/plant. In addition, an ongoing daily loss would have to be expected which could be in the order of e.g. 250 000 EUR/day/plant, depending on the location. Furthermore, restarting the plants is questionable if supply chains could no longer be serviced and customers globally look for other suppliers in the meantime. Thus, entire sites would be at risk. With China's global market share in man-made fiber production already exceeding 70 %, a scenario is more than realistic that China will also take over these supply chains, thus leading to an even greater dependence on China.

The vast majority of power plants used for the production of man-made fibers, especially the highly efficient combined gas-and-steam power plants based on the principle of cogeneration with efficiencies of 90 %, are designed exclusively for the use of natural gas. Quite often, there are no technical facilities for operating gas turbines or steam boilers with fuels other than natural gas. Only in exceptional cases could a switch be made to mineral oil. However, even in these cases, the necessary stockpiling of mineral oil is designed only for a short-term failure of the gas burners. A change to base-load supply with mineral oil could take a time window of between 3 and 56 months, depending on the type of plant and taking into account licensing requirements. The use of hydrogen as an energy source is only possible in the very long term. In the few cases where natural gas can be substituted, investment costs of EUR 250 million/plant can be incurred, depending on the emission level of the converted plant.

A natural gas embargo imposed by the European Union on the Russian Federation would not only mean the cessation of production and the end for man-made fiber producers, but also for other industries such as basic chemicals, paper, metal production and glass and ceramics manufacturing, as well as their related sectors. As the German economic institute Institut der Deutschen Wirtschaft Köln e. V. (IW Köln) concluded in its summary report 40/2022 of April 2022: "No one can accurately predict what future these businesses would then still have in Germany. That would be an unprecedented development."

Source:

Industrievereinigung Chemiefaser e.V.

Feierten 100 Jahre erfolgreiche Forschung: Professor Götz T. Gresser, Vorstand der DITF, Ralf Barth, Bürgermeister von Denkendorf, Wirtschaftsministerin Dr. Nicole Hoffmeister-Kraut MdL, Professor Michael R. Buchmeiser, Vorstandsvorsitzender DITF, Peter Steiger, Vorstand DITF (v.li.). Foto: DITF
24.02.2022

DITF feierten 100+1 Jahre

Wie so viele Ereignisse musste auch die Jubiläumsfeier der Deutschen Institute für Textil- und Faserforschung (DITF) verschoben werden. So waren es am 22.2.2022 100+1 Jahre Textilforschung, die gefeiert wurden. Unter dem Motto „Let’s celebrate the textile future“ hatten die DITF ins Haus der Wirtschaft in Stuttgart eingeladen.

Zu Beginn der Veranstaltung nahm der DITF-Jubiläumsfilm die Zuschauer mit auf eine Zeitreise und zeigte Impressionen von der Gründung des Deutschen Forschungsinstituts für Textilindustrie in Reutlingen-Stuttgart bis zu den heutigen Technika und Laboren des modernen Forschungszentrums in Denkendorf, wo sich ab den 70er-Jahren alle Forschungsbereiche zusammengefunden hatten: von der Chemie über den Maschinenbau, die Verfahrenstechnik zu den Wirtschaftswissenschaften.

Wie so viele Ereignisse musste auch die Jubiläumsfeier der Deutschen Institute für Textil- und Faserforschung (DITF) verschoben werden. So waren es am 22.2.2022 100+1 Jahre Textilforschung, die gefeiert wurden. Unter dem Motto „Let’s celebrate the textile future“ hatten die DITF ins Haus der Wirtschaft in Stuttgart eingeladen.

Zu Beginn der Veranstaltung nahm der DITF-Jubiläumsfilm die Zuschauer mit auf eine Zeitreise und zeigte Impressionen von der Gründung des Deutschen Forschungsinstituts für Textilindustrie in Reutlingen-Stuttgart bis zu den heutigen Technika und Laboren des modernen Forschungszentrums in Denkendorf, wo sich ab den 70er-Jahren alle Forschungsbereiche zusammengefunden hatten: von der Chemie über den Maschinenbau, die Verfahrenstechnik zu den Wirtschaftswissenschaften.

Die Bedeutung der Denkendorfer Textilforschung für alle Zukunftsthemen unterstrichen die Wirtschaftsministerin des Landes Baden-Württemberg, Dr. Nicole Hoffmeister-Kraut und die Parlamentarische Staatsekretärin im Bundeswirtschaftsministerium, Dr. Franziska Brantner. Dr. Brantner lobte die DITF dafür, sich immer wieder neu zu erfinden und neu zu entdecken. Damit trage das Forschungszentrum wesentlich dazu bei, Digitalisierung und Klimaschutz zusammenzubringen.

Für die Festvorträge konnten Dr. Antje von Dewitz, VAUDE, Professor Klaus Müllen, Max-Planck-Institut für Polymerforschung, und Peter Dornier, Lindauer Dornier, gewonnen werden. Alle drei widmeten sich zentralen Zukunftsthemen wie Nachhaltigkeit und Digitalisierung. Dr. von Dewitz zeigte am Beispiel von VAUDE, dass Umwelt- und Klimaschutz den wirtschaftlichen Erfolg nicht bremsen, sondern für Wachstum sorgen können. Obwohl Textilunternehmen bisher nicht als umweltfreundlich gelten, haben sie großes Innovationspotenzial und können ganzheitlich Verantwortung übernehmen.

Im Anschluss konnten die Besucher durch eine Ausstellung bummeln, in der die zwölf Kompetenz- und Technologiezentren der DITF Beispiele ihrer Forschung zeigten.